Early in my career at Rise Against Hunger (then known as Stop Hunger Now), I spent a week in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. In Cité Soleil, one of the most impoverished communities in the world, I visited an elementary school with Pastor Leon from our partner Haiti Outreach Ministries. Outside the school, a woman had a large blue tarp spread on the ground in front of her, on top of which were dozens of mud “cookies.” Pastor Leon explained to me the cookies were a mixture of mud and fat “baked” on the tarp beneath the hot Haitian sun, and eaten by some students to stave off hunger. Later during lunch, as the students happily ate Rise Against Hunger meals, I thought about the stark contrast between the nutritious meals they were eating versus a “cookie” made of mud and fat.

I departed Haiti on January 11, 2010, one day before a devastating earthquake struck. In collaboration with Haiti Outreach Ministries and other partners, Rise Against Hunger responded immediately by distributing more than 1 million meals, which were already on the ground in Haiti. Soon after the earthquake and in the years since, many more Rise Against Hunger meals and in-kind aid have continued to support Haiti’s recovery.  I’ve seen firsthand what a tremendous impact Rise Against Hunger has made on more than millions of lives in Haiti and elsewhere around the world, and want to sincerely thank the hundreds of thousands of volunteers, donors and hunger champions who are making it possible for us to end hunger by 2030…or sooner!

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