DES MOINES, Iowa — The World Food Prize Foundation hosted the 19th annual Iowa Hunger Summit Wednesday where leaders and advocates from across the state came together to try to tackle the challenges of hunger.

The day at the World Food Prize Hall of Laureates in downtown Des Moines was filled with speeches, breakout sessions, lunch and important discussions surrounding hunger in Iowa. 

This year’s theme, From the Ground Up, underscored the importance of nurturing sustainable solutions to food insecurity at every stage of life.

State senators and representatives were in attendance, along with former Governor Terry Branstad. Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig was also there and a speaker at lunch.

There were people from all sides with a common goal in mind: end hunger.

Save the Children Action Network (SCAN) had a petition at their table against Governor Kim Reynold’s new summer food program, Healthy Kids Iowa.

“I think it’s definitely better than nothing,” SCAN’s Iowa State Manager Paige Chickering said. “We’re really excited to have those federal dollars coming into the state with the goal of trying to address food insecurity specifically for kids over the summer. We know that in those summer months, when kids lose access to free and reduced priced school meals, we really see a leap in food insecurity among children. So that’s been, that’s been a well-documented process. And we are happy that something’s being done to try to address that problem. However, we do have an alternative to this program, and that alternative is the summer EBT, SUN Bucks program. That program would have brought in $29 million in federal funding to Iowa and serve 245,000 children in Iowa. Comparatively, the Healthy Kids Iowa program brought in $9 million and is serving only 65,000 children.”

This was a bipartisan event that accommodated different opinions to be discussed for one common goal.

“We’re blessed to have a lot of folks that get up every single day thinking about how they can improve the communities that they live in,” Secretary Naig said. “The Iowa spirit is exactly why I can remain optimistic when I look at the issues that confront us and that we can make progress on things like, yes, food insecurity.”

During his lunch speech, Naig brought up his new Choose Iowa Food Purchasing Pilot Program for Schools, where schools are connected with farmers they can buy locally from.

The Iowa Hunger Summit attendees were open to hearing different ideas, like that one.

“Folks are really trying to come together and find different creative solutions to the issue of food insecurity and hunger,” Chickering said. “Being in an agricultural state. How can we be innovative and support programs that both support our huge agriculture economy and also help feed Iowans right here in our state?”

“Iowa Agriculture is truly a productivity powerhouse, and most of the time when we think about that, we think of it being a powerhouse related to commodities,” Naig said. “Thank you for your commitment to feeding everyone, and for being hunger fighters. We need to do this together.”

To end the afternoon, there was an hour of packaging over 35,000 meals that will be distributed directly to lowans through Meals from the Heartland.

Another highlight of the day was when the Robert D. Ray Humanitarian Award was given to Davenport’s Tapestry Farms executive director Ann McGlynn, who works with refugees.

Iowa News: