JIM HENDRICKS: Lawmakers tackle global hunger issue

Feeding the world is no small job and last week U.S. Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Marietta, and U.S. Rep. Austin Scott, R-Tifton, brought the issue home — to Scott’s hometown.

Meeting at the University of Georgia’s conference center at its Tifton campus, the lawmakers led a round-table discussion of Georgia’s role in dealing with global hunger.

joining in the discussions were representatives of the Malawi Ministry of Agriculture, CARE International, U.S. Global Leadership Coalition, U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Research Service, the Georgia Department of Agriculture, the UGA School of Agriculture, the American Peanut Council and MANA Nutrition.

“Georgia has always had a special connection with our nation’s food aid programs, in particular with peanut-based supplements which provide vitamins and protein,” Scott noted. “As we look toward writing the next farm bill, many programs remain at the forefront of our minds when crafting policies that spur crop production and provide resources to turn crops like Georgia peanuts into lifesaving and life sustaining products.”

Numbers from the event are sobering. Around the world, estimates are that more than 795 million people are chronically hungry, causing stunted growth for about 161 million children under 5 years old. Scott says that hunger and malnutrition kill more people than HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis do combined.

And the job’s going to get much bigger in the near future. Projections are that the world population will swell to 9.6 billion people over the next three and a half decades. With 20 percent of the world’s cropland unsuitable for farming, production will have to increase a whopping 60 percent to feed that many people, according to numbers from the round table.

Still there have been some successes. USAID released its newest “Feed the Future Snapshot” on Sept. 15, saying that since the Feed the Future Initiative began, 9 million people have been lifted from poverty — 19 percent decrease in poverty in countries served by Feed the Future.

The report says that about 1.7 million households in countries served by the initiative no longer suffer from hunger and that it has led to 1.8 million fewer children in countries served facing stunting, a 26 percent decrease in developmental issues among children.

Family farmers, the target of Feed the Future ’s strategy, have made more than $2.6 billion in new agricultural sales, the organization says, with new tools and technologies are helping lead to higher crop yields.

Isakson, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, worked to get the Global Security Act of 2016 pushed through Congress. Reauthorization of that act is expected to be taken up next year, the same time that the new farm bill will be front and center in Congress.

Perdue joins HBCU Caucus

On Friday, U.S. Sen. David Perdue, R-Sea Island, announced that he had joined the Bipartisan Congressional HBCU Caucus, which focuses on Historically Black Colleges & Universities, such as Albany State University.

“Georgia is home to 10 fantastic HBCUs that play an important role in educating America’s next leaders,” Perdue said. “I’m excited to join the Bipartisan Congressional HBCU Caucus and look forward to working with my colleagues to highlight HBCUs and tackle the challenges they face.”

The senator, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, also looked at a couple of U.S. defense issues last week. After meeting with Mark Esper, President Trump’s nominee for secretary of the Army, Perdue said Esper’s “business experience paired with his military service makes him a great choice to fill this critical post within the Department of Defense.”

Perdue said he and Esper, who would be the top civilian in the Army, “discussed the urgent need to focus on the Army’s readiness and the need to recap the major platforms in the Army to meet the ever changing global threats. I look forward to hearing more on how he plans to address these and other challenges facing the Army today during his confirmation hearing before the Armed Services Committee.”

Regarding the president imposing additional sanctions against North Korea, Perdue said, “President Trump was very clear to world leaders at the United Nations that he would do whatever necessary to rein in the deranged regime of Kim Jong Un.It didn’t take long for President Trump to follow through and take strong action to hold North Korea accountable for its dangerous behavior.”

The senator said Trump sent “a loud message … to financial institutions around the world: choose between doing business with the U.S., or supporting a rogue regime.”

Email Jim Hendricks at [email protected]. Follow @ABH_JHendricks on Twitter.