Mary’s Meals Statement on World Hunger Day
Famine has no place in the 21st century.
World Hunger Day 2024
Ahead of World Hunger Day on May 28, the CEO and founder of global school feeding charity Mary’s Meals, Magnus MacFarlane-Barrow, urges that action be taken to address increasing levels of hunger worldwide and to prevent famine in Ethiopia. Mary’s Meals and its expert partners work alongside local communities in 17 countries to provide meals at school for more than 2.4 million children, who often bear the impact of extreme hunger because of poverty, conflict, and climate shocks.
“Famines don’t happen overnight, ever. They’re always months – and more often years – in the making. The human family always has ample opportunity to intervene. That’s why famines should, long ago, have been a thing of the past. Never mind our broader battle to try to achieve Zero Hunger. Famine should have no place in the 21st century. I can’t think of a more profound collective failing of humanity than to let famine occur,” stated MacFarlane-Barrow.
The 2024 Global Report on Food Crises shows that more than 281 million people in 59 countries and territories face high levels of acute food insecurity – nearly 24 million more than the previous year – and 36.4 million children are acutely malnourished. Impacted by conflict, climate change, displacement, and economic downturns, millions are suffering from hunger, with the risk of famine imminent in some areas. In the Tigray region of Ethiopia (which is one of 16 countries noted in the report where Mary’s Meals provides school feeding), many people fear an impending famine that could be on par with or worse than the famine of the mid-1980s.
