World Vision calls on G7 leaders to use Apulia Summit to end child hunger and malnutrition.

For immediate release

International relief and development agency World Vision is urging action from the G7 leaders this week to address the devastating impact of the global food crisis on children.

As part of the organisation’s global “Enough” campaign to tackle child hunger and malnutrition, World Vision has issued four recommendations to the leaders who are gathering in Apulia, Italy between 13-15 June, 2024.

Recommendations:

• Develop a global plan to end the food insecurity and malnutrition crisis through greater accountability and coordination. Invest in prevention, preparedness, and anticipatory action to reduce humanitarian need and build community resilience. Prevent the use of hunger as a weapon of war and establish national plans to address emerging food crises, ensuring the rights to food and essential nutrition actions.
• IDA21 replenishment emphasizes the need to direct resources to the most vulnerable populations, with a particular focus on children in fragile contexts and places of extreme poverty. It calls for strengthened efforts to ensure that children in the poorest and most crisis-affected countries have access to essential, transformative, and accelerating services through IDA funding. The World Bank is encouraged to consider a specific lens on youth and children, in addition to or combined with the current planned lens on gender, which is welcomed. 
• Prioritize comprehensive child-centered policies and strategies to accelerate progress towards achieving Zero Hunger and SDG2 and ending all forms of malnutrition. These should include short-medium term responses with clear timeframes for significant progress by 2030, alongside longer-term solutions based on lessons learned from successful interventions.
• Scale up investments in providing healthy and nutritious school meals , with a focus on adolescent girls. This will enhance enrolment, stabilize attendance rates, and reduce absenteeism, while also helping to prevent early pregnancy and early marriage among girls.

For more information contact Andrea Galante, World Vision’s Policy Advisor for Food Security and Nutrition at andrea_galante@wvi.org.

ENDS

World Vision is a Christian humanitarian organisation dedicated to working with children, families and their communities to reach their full potential by tackling the root causes of poverty and injustice. World Vision serves all people, regardless of religion, race, ethnicity or gender.  For more information, please visit www.wvi.org or follow us on Twitter @WorldVision

Through World Vision’s Global Hunger Response  and ENOUGH campaign, the organisation is responding to the immediate needs of the most vulnerable girls, boys, and their families who are experiencing acute hunger in 28 countries of highest alert where World Vision operates, highlighting the driving factors and impacts of hunger, malnutrition, and food insecurity on children globally, and advocating to governments and donors to do more to prevent mass starvation.