#BlogToFeedAChild Post

• I am going to #BlogToFeedAChild with Akshaya Patra and BlogAdda.

Hunger is a shame. It is a shame on humanity and on the developed world. It turns into a shame just by existing in the 21st century. You are sitting in front of your computer screen after a meal/ snack and did it ever cross your mind that the meal was a privilege?

Mid-day meal schemes go a long way in solving this problem because they have universal coverage and target the right age group, the one in dire need of good nutrition. NGOs, SHGs can all come together and join hands toward funding and executing these schemes. There can be targeted funding for such schemes just like Akshaya Patra (see link above). Fund generation is a major yet only a part of the whole scheme of things. Execution and marketing of these schemes also constitute a major part of these.

Food in itself is incentive enough for any below poverty line citizen but the awareness and importance of schooling needs to be brought before the people's eyes for its full impact. Holding camps, talks, street-plays can be one way to attract attention. Making it (sending children to school) a compulsory activity for jobs under government projects can be another way.

CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) can play a major role here too. It can majorly help with the funding and food grain procurement. Restaurants that have no channels to dispose excess cooked food can tie up with an NGO and the food can be distributed to the needy. Innovative ideas bringing efficiency in the system can help eradicate this menace which, truth be told, should not exist. 

If we are able to achieve this goal and in the next decade, we are hunger free as a nation, imagine the kind of efficiency our workforce is going to have. Anyway, we are going to be one of the youngest nations (working age-group-wise) in the World and we need to come out with all our guns blazing to make good use of this youth. 

Hunger will breed criminals. Absence of the same can open the options wide.