Nine students and one staff member from the Department of Dietetics and Human Nutrition recently attended the 10th Universities Fighting World Hunger Summit. The summit held February 20-22, 2015 at the University of Guelph in Guelph, Ontario, Canada, focused on the interactive roles the community, business, academia and education can play in fighting hunger around the globe. Keynote speakers included Alex Moore from D.C. Central Kitchens, Washington, DC; Gavin Armstrong, President and CEO, The Lucky Iron Fish™; and Ms. Julie Marshall, Canadian Spokesperson, World Food Programme.
Amanda Hege, Director of Community Outreach in the Department of Dietetics and Human Nutrition (DHN), shared, “Food is a human right, the fuel we need to survive and thrive. DHN students and staff who attended the 2015 Summit learned simple solutions to end hunger. Our job is to ensure that food is available, accessible, affordable, acceptable, nutritionally adequate, sufficient and safe for every human being, domestic and abroad.”
Students who attend the Summit along with Hege included Denise Schaeffer, Connor Appelman, Victoria Bastin, Sydney Hobbs, Bridgette Boyer, Jordan Bressler, Walter Brown, Liz Renzaglia and Mary Boulanger. Bastin, Bressler and Boulanger each shared their hunger-related research through poster sessions at the Summit.
Boulanger, who will be attending UK’s medical school in the fall, commented, “Attending the Universities Fighting World Hunger Summit has deepened my understanding about the true complexity of hunger. Nutrition, medicine, agriculture, politics, and business all have a pivotal role to play in reducing local and world hunger.”
To learn more about the 2015 Universities Fighting World Hunger Summit, visit the Summit website at http://wp.auburn.edu/ufwh2/summit/. Additional information about the Universities Fighting World Hunger collaborative is available at: http://wp.auburn.edu/ufwh2/.
Victoria Bastin
Mary Boulanger
Jordan Bressler