World Food Day Release No.0429.98 Remarks of Secretary Dan Glickman World Food Day University of California, Davis -- October 16, 1998 Thank you Vic. As Congressman Fazio mentioned, our friendship goes back to my years in Congress. Listing his accomplishments would take up most of the afternoon, though after 20 years serving our nation in Congress, it might be a nice way to give Vic Fazio our thanks. I will say this, Vic Fazio has been the spark plug in developing closer ties between USDA and UC Davis, most recently helping to bring USDA's Western Human Nutrition Research Center here, as well as the new Lyng Building which we dedicated earlier today. The Lyng building is the largest USDA building outside of Washington and Kansas City and will be the hub for a full range of USDA services: research, food safety, conservation, helping farmers and ranchers manage risk, inspection services, working with rural communities and more. You heard from Deputy Secretary Rich Rominger a few moments ago. I just wanted to say that this man is by my side every day. Not only does he give me the farmers' perspective and the California perspective, but the UC Davis perspective as well. I want you to know that, as one of your more distinguished alumni, Rich Rominger does the people of California and of all agriculture proud. Chancellor Vanderhoef, thank you for being here today and for all your help in bringing USDA and UC Davis closer together which will be very beneficial to nutrition research. Dean Schneeman, thank you for your kind remarks. I also want to thank you for your hard work in helping to revise the food guide pyramid. I understand you have a weakness for chocolate. Well, I want you to know, I'm a big believer in perseverance, in fighting for what you believe in. So if you keep up the good fight Dr. Schneeman, maybe one day you'll get your wish and have chocolate reclassified as a vitamin. I want to thank everyone for coming out today in recognition of World Food Day. It's a day we recognize that the overflowing food bins of America's supermarkets are the exception rather than the norm around the world. Today we stand on the cusp of a new millennium, reveling in the accomplishments of human kind -- from putting a man on the moon to curing some of history's most memorable diseases. Yet, with all that this world has achieved, perhaps the greatest challenge we face, is one that has eluded us for centuries. One in 7 of the world's people suffer from hunger and malnutrition. Of course, hunger and malnutrition are not problems that solely plague developing countries. We haven't beaten it here in the United States. No country has which tells us that defeating our enemy is far more complex than simply producing enough food. We also have to fight poverty, encourage political stability, protect natural resources, invest in infrastructure, and more. To beat hunger, we have to get at its root. That's something I committed this nation to helping accomplish when I led the U.S. delegation to the World Food Summit two years ago. That was an experience. I met some amazing people, and had a rather 'unique' encounter. My speech did the broad overview of U.S. commitments to helping cut the number of the world's hungry in half by 2015. In that context, it mentioned science, and its hope of feeding more people without wrecking the environment. I thought I did OK. But after the speech, protesters started pelting me with genetically engineered soybeans, which wouldn't have been all that bad if they then hadn't taken off all their clothes and held a naked press conference. They had things written on their bodies like 'the naked truth' and 'no gene bean'... at least that's what my staff who looked tell me. In the coming century the world must face some very fundamental questions on world hunger: How do we feed a growing world without destroying a fixed and fragile landbase? Should we control populations? If so, how? Will the world accept new technologies for increasing yields? How do we feed everyone, not just those who can afford it? How do we assure that the food people get meet minimum standards for proper health and nutrition? A MULTIFACETED APPROACH In our search for answers, we must understand there is no simple, single solution and there is no one place to find the answers. Government has a key role. So does the private sector and volunteer organizations and individual citizens. The students at UC Davis represent a core group of scientific minds that will help determine if, in the 21st century, we are finally able to turn the tide in the centuries-old struggle against hunger and malnutrition. From past experience we've learned that it is neither affordable nor productive to simply throw food at the problem. If we are to make actual inroads against hunger, then we can't just rush from famine to famine. There's an old Chinese proverb: 'Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.' We've got to get at the root causes of hunger -- poverty, income inequality, political instability and more. At USDA we have a broad range of programs that let us take a wide angle view of hunger and poverty. Our core responsibilities are to production agriculture -- making sure farmers can make a decent living from the land, so they can continue feeding our nation and much of the world. This is my #1 priority as the U.S. farm economy plunges into its deepest financial crisis in decades -- due in large part to the world's economic woes. USDA is home to the U.S. Forest Service and our nation's largest private-lands conservation effort. So we have a thing or two to do with managing natural resources and we all know how important that is being able to produce food sustainably. We're also the department of rural America. In that sense, we know a little bit about helping people in outlying areas. We are helping bring safe running water, housing, economic development and top-notch education and health care to country communities. On the international front we have programs that encourage and build trade that lifts both countries economically, and programs to help those who need humanitarian assistance. The United States is one of the largest donors of food aid in the world. In fact, the President recently authorized donations of 2.5 million metric tons of wheat to various hungry nations, over and above our traditional aid programs. And, USDA is the federal anti-hunger department. We oversee school meals, the Women, Infants and Children program and food stamps. And while these programs and scientific research are the front lines in our battle, everyone can and should play a role. I've made gleaning and food recovery a top priority -- working with farmers, restaurants, markets, food producers, volunteer organizations -- to ensure that excess wholesome food makes it to struggling families who need it a whole lot more than a dumpster does. Gleaning is an effective way to get fresh fruits and vegetables to people who don't normally get them. Also, food drives are a good way to supplement the food safety net. In fact, we've got one starting today at USDA that uses everything from walking and running for donations to putting on a talent show. I've been known to sing at USDA talent shows in the past, but so far I haven't been asked. Maybe they're trying to tell me something. COMMUNITY FOOD PROJECT GRANTS USDA is out there, using our wide range of skills and experience to win this war. But one of the core beliefs of this administration is that a very positive role for government is to act as a catalyst to help communities help themselves. So instead of only feeding people, we help communities work at the grass roots level to weed out hunger. At USDA we have a program called Community Food Project Grants that helps communities tackle hunger neighborhood by neighborhood over the long term. Today I'm proud to announce an additional $2.4 million toward that effort. For example, in the city of Berkeley where school children report that they never eat fresh vegetables at home and are rejecting nutritious school meals in favor of fast food, USDA's grant of $175,000 will help a number of organizations develop a citywide food programs that include nutrition education for students, food-related job training and a closer connection to local area organic farms. This will help more kids get in tune with good health and nutrition. Or out in Stockton, USDA's grant of $125,000 will help residents of a low income housing complex develop their own sustainable farm. Not only will it help provide food for their families and their neighbors, but it will help provide the nutritional content often lacking in low-income diets. All over the country we are helping communities develop creative responses to hunger and malnutrition from training people in the business of food production to teaching folks how to grow urban gardens on abandoned lots to bringing more farmers markets and their fresh affordable produce to the inner city. The more we can empower people and communities, the less they will have to rely on government aid and the more they can rely on themselves and each other. SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY But one of the areas that we are heavily engaged in, and that UC Davis is an important partner in, is research. Research has been a fundamental responsibility of USDA since the day in 1862 when we opened our doors and the first agriculture secretary had an experimental garden right in front of our office building in Washington. Today we do research on everything from genetically engineered crops to human nutrition -- work that will have a significant impact on our quest to answer perhaps the most important question of the 21st century: how do we feed a growing world sustainably? The staggering potential of science crystallized for me two years ago when I traveled to the international wheat and corn research center --CYMMET-- in Texcoco, Mexico. These laboratories are the birthplace of the Green Revolution --the massive technological advances of the '60s that enabled us to feed a rapidly growing world without destroying our environment. When I toured his facility, I was stunned into silence by a sign on one of the walls. It had to do with Norin 10 --the dwarfing gene for wheat -- the sign read: 'A single gene ... has saved 100 million lives.' Science and technology still hold the most promise in our efforts to eradicate hunger and improve nutrition. That's where the link between universities like UC Davis and USDA becomes so important. The work you do here in such areas as nutrition in pregnancy and fetal development, childhood nutrition; the relationship of nutrition to chronic diseases; or how your Program in International Nutrition looks at problems in less developed countries is of major importance in the battle to eliminate malnutrition around the world. Look at some of the things we're doing today. Our scientists recently found that prolonged hunger in infants may effect their tolerance for lactose -- so when some starving infants finally get milk they reject it. We've found various cancer fighting ingredients in fruits and vegetables. A new and exciting frontier in research is phytonutrients. They may protect DNA or delay the onset of heart disease or cataracts or other maladies -- all based on what we eat or don't eat. And it's not only what we find, it's what we develop. For example to help in dire emergency feeding situations like major disasters or at refugee camps, we've developed a precooked powdered food, fortified with vitamins and minerals that does not need reheating -- just add water. An important thing to note is what I mean when I say 'we'. USDA is rarely on its own in research. Instead we depend on a triangle partnership between our agencies, universities like UC Davis, and the private sector. If two heads are better than one, then three heads are better than two. I'm particularly proud of the fact that USDA's Western Human Nutrition Research Center has relocated to this campus. Your focus at UC Davis on nutrition and food and their relationship to human health and the prevention of disease in the coming century will make a strong contribution to this nation's efforts in this area. CONCLUSION The United States is not only a military or economic superpower, we are a food superpower as well. We are agriculturally blessed, but with that good fortune also comes responsibility. In the words of our great former Secretary of State, George Marshall, when faced with the formidable task of feeding and rebuilding Europe after World War II, told America that 'whether we like it or not, we find ourselves, our nation, in a world position of vast responsibility. We can act for our own good by acting for the world's good.' Today, those same words could be used to describe our responsibility not only to feed people, but to ensure that the great strides made in nutritional science are used to combat malnutrition and ensure good health. The hard fact is the world faces a daunting challenge and the United States has an obligation to lead. More than eight hundred million people are hungry or malnourished, and world population is expected to grow at the rate of a New York City every month, bringing the number of people on this planet to over 9 billion by 2043. If history tells us anything, it's that we need a broad, comprehensive approach and that we all need to be a part. On World Food Day, -- from the budding scientists in this room, to the farmers in the fields, to the neighborhood volunteers -- whoever you are, whatever you do, the point is each of us, in our own way, can make a difference. If we can really defeat hunger and malnutrition, then we will lift the entire community of nations to a higher plateau, one in which all people have ready access to good health, nutritious food and a decent standard of living. Thank you. #