Keeping Global Nutrition on the Table

USAID Impact Blog

I had the honor of contributing an article to the Feed the Future blog last Thursday. The post was also published on the USAID Impact blog. Though I did share the article on my social media channels, I wanted to post the links here as well. I hope you will visit and read more about why we should keep the topic of global nutrition on the table and a little about the innovative work of Feed the Future.

A fellow Global Team of 200 member, Julia Gibson, also contributed a great article called Filling the Bellies of Hungry Kids. Shivani Cotter wrote a piece called It’s The Silent Killer: Undernutrition.

To join the conversation about global health issues including #nutrition, follow @USAID@USAIDGH and @FeedtheFuture on Twitter and use #GHMatters.

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Philanthropy Friday: A Pearl of Fair Trade

Each Friday, the another jennifer blog shares stories of those who incorporate philanthropy into their everyday lives – personally and professionally – in a creative and unique way. If you have a story you’d like to share, please contact Jennifer. You can view past posts from the series here.

Fair trade pearls offered by Jules and Company.

Fair trade pearls offered by Jules and Company.

Julia Simpson is passionate about fair trade. It all started when her husband was sent to work in the Philippines for three years. While she was there, she would visit the many bizarres in the area. Julia would shop and connect with the vendors selling their wares, everything from tupperware to jewelry.

As time went on, she became friendly with a local co-op that offered beautiful fresh water pearl jewelry. She got to know the artisans who made the jewelry and saw first hand how the co-op worked.

She saw that the artisans received retirement and medical benefits, two items that aren’t even required for fair trade companies.

Talking with Julia, her commitment to the women in the co-op is apparent.

Julia realized that by selling their jewelry back in the United States, she would be helping to keep women home and avoid being exported to work in another country or forced to work in the sex trade. She chose fresh water pearls because she’s always loved pearl jewelry.

You can buy fair trade fresh water jewelry from Jules and Company online or via Julia directly. Her offerings are beautiful and very reasonably priced. She also works with nonprofits who sell the fair trade jewelry to raise money.

Julia is also a full-time farmer who maintains an organic berry farm in Dresden, Maine. I love the fact a purchase of her jewelry supports talented artisans in the Philippines and my own local economy at the same time. Her goal and motivation is to sell enough jewelry to help 10 women get hired by the co-op each year.

Do you enjoy pearl jewelry? Do you look for fair trade products when shopping? 

Philanthropy Friday: Food For Thought on Global Nutrition

Each Friday, the another jennifer blog shares stories of those who incorporate philanthropy into their everyday lives – personally and professionally – in a creative and unique way. If you have a story you’d like to share, please contact Jennifer. You can view past posts from the series here.

FOOD_FOR_THOUGH_300According to Save the Children’s new report, good nutrition can help kids learn and even earn more money when they grow up.

That’s in addition to growing up healthy and strong, of course.

But we’ve got to nourish our children first.

There are 165 million children in the world who are chronically malnourished. Without a nutritious diet, kids can have trouble answering basic math problems and reading simple sentences. Their growth is often stunted. Malnourished children are often poor, lack education and access to good jobs.

Even with these problems, Food for Thought shows us the opportunities. Well nourished children are 13% more likely to be in the correct grade at school, boosting lifelong skills. Fixing malnutrition now could bring economic benefits over 100 times as large as the costs of interventions.

Why am I telling you all of this? Because President Obama and other world leaders are about to convene for the Nutrition for Growth summit in London in advance of this year’s G8 summit.

You can make your voice heard by letting them know that all kids need to get healthy food.

Click on the link to tweet: @whitehouse let’s make sure all kids get healthy food in their #next1000days so they can reach their full potential. #Nutrition4Growth

Join me, Save the Children, the Global Team of 200 and Mom Bloggers for Social Good in showing our world leaders that global nutrition should be on their agenda.

If you’d like to earn your cape as a supermom in the kitchen, you can also share a healthy recipe for kids that either has 8 ingredients or costs under $8 to make.

While I’m not much of a cook, I am lucky in that my kids love vegetables. My good friend and food blogger, Linda D’Alessandro, shared with me her recipe for kale chips. They sound super yummy to me!

Linda's kale chips last about 5 minutes when she makes them!

Linda’s kale chips last about 5 minutes when she makes them!

Gr8 Kale Chips

Bunch of Curly Kale (washed, dried and tore into pieces without the stem)
2 Tablespoons Olive Oil
Coarse Salt
Garlic Powder
3 Tablespoons Nutritional Yeast

Toss kale (better if you massage them with your hands) in a big bowl with olive oil, coarse salt, a sprinkle of garlic powder and nutritional yeast. Spread the kale onto two rimmed baking sheets and bake it at 350°F for 10 – 12 minutes, making sure it doesn’t burn, and stirring it gently a couple of times.

Note from Linda: It takes time to find the right balance between heat and cooking times, depending on the oven. So don’t give up after the first try! You can start with plain Kale chips without adding the nutritional yeast. My kids, hubby included, love it!

You can drool over Linda’s blog, Le CuGine d’America. (No worries. It’s in English.)

Are you a supermom (or superdad!) that cares about good nutrition for all kids? 

For today’s Philanthropy Friday, I’m asking you to incorporate giving back into your life by tweeting, sharing this post or writing your own post to support global nutrition.

I wrote this post as part of the Global Team of 200, a highly specialized group of Mom Bloggers for Social Good members who focus on maternal health, children, hunger, and women and girls.

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