World Food Day – Let’s End Hunger

October 16th marks World Food Day – a day to put into the social focus the need to band together to end hunger in our lifetime! Here are 5 key facts you should know about hunger:

• One in nine people on Earth do not have enough food to lead an active, healthy life – around 795 million people.
• Although Asia is the continent with the most hungry people – around two-thirds of the total, Sub-Saharan Africa is the region with the highest prevalence (percentage of the population) of hunger. One person in four in the African continent is undernourished, according to the World Food Programme.
• Poor nutrition causes nearly half of all deaths (45%) in children under the age of five – which is around 3.1 million children every year.
• If women farmers had the same access to resources as men, the number of hungry in the world could be reduced by up to 150 million, according to the WFP.
• According to the Global Hunger Index, 52 countries are suffering from “serious” or “alarming” levels of hunger, of which the Central African Republic suffers the greatest level of hunger (which is defined by a number of factors, including child mortality).

Source: World Food Programme

Sometimes, these statistics seem overwhelming; too big of a problem for any one person to solve. And you would be right; for one person, this global problem is too big. But luckily, and especially on days like today, we don’t have to do it alone. As they say “Many hands make light work”. By coming together to address world hunger, we can inch closer and closer to a solution.

One way we at Lux Catering and Events try to add our hands to solving this problem is by donating our services and products to Volunteers of America, who provide food and nutrition services across the nation among many other services for those in need.

Here are pictures from a fun and festive event for VOA in which we made a donation:

Sometimes though, it is great to take a grassroots approach and contribute closer to home. According to the Utah Food Bank:

• 1 in 5 Utah kids are unsure of where their next meal will come.
• 1 in 6 Utahns are at risk of missing a meal today.
• 444,000 people are food insecure – 16% of the state population.

It never hurts to directly help your local food bank or homeless shelter by donating non-perishable foods as well as money. Perhaps a more fun and tasty way to help your local community is to be a patron of a company that actively contributes to the community – like our friends at Even Stevens!

We feel a close connection to Even Stevens as they were with us as one of the original 13 applicants to become Benefit Corporations when SB 133 was signed into law!  Even Stevens is a local sandwich franchise that has made it their mission to not only serve delicious food but to donate a sandwich to one of 12 non-profit partners for every sandwich that is purchased! For September 2015 alone, they donated a whopping 25,671 sandwiches!! That is food directly in the bellies of our local peers and slowly but surely kicking hunger in Utah out the door.

Even Stevens has grown so much, you can now find them in 3 locations around the Salt Lake Valley. Kill two birds with one stone and go get a delicious sandwich for you and someone in need in your community!