JOSETTE SHEERAN

Every 10 seconds we lose a child to hunger. This is more than HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis combined.

Food security is not only a matter of humanitarian assistance and agricultural development; it is a matter of national security, peace and stability.

This isn't one of those rare diseases that we don't have the solution for. We know how to fix hunger.

With climate change and health crises rightfully receiving international attention, the time has come to focus on hunger as a top priority. WHO regards hunger and malnutrition as the gravest threat to public health, and climate change threatens to further destabilise already fragile food-production systems.

One cup of food a day changes Fabian's life completely. But this morning, about a billion people on Earth - or one out of every seven - woke up and didn't even know how to fill this cup. One out of every seven people.

If a child in its first thousand days - from conception to two years old - does not have adequate nutrition, the damage is irreversible.

There's nothing more haunting than the cry of a child that cannot be returned with food - the most fundamental expectation of every human being.

Women are the face of hunger. Hunger has a female face. It affects women disproportionately, and therefore it affects children as well, and it gets passed on inter-generationally, too.

Seize the moment – don’t wait for anyone to give you permission.

I believe we're living at a time in human history where it's just simply unacceptable that children wake up and don't know where to find a cup of food. Not only that, transforming hunger is an opportunity, but I think we have to change our mindsets … I would like you to join with all of humanity to draw a line in the sand and say, "No more. No more are we going to accept this." And we want to tell our grandchildren that there was a terrible time in history where up to a third of the children had brains and bodies that were stunted, but that exists no more.

If a child in its first thousand days - from conception to two years old - does not have adequate nutrition, the damage is irreversible.

There's nothing more haunting than the cry of a child that cannot be returned with food - the most fundamental expectation of every human being.

Eighty percent of the people in the world have no food safety net. When disaster strikes - the economy gets blown, people lose a job, floods, war, conflict, bad governance, all of those things - there is nothing to fall back on.

Women are the face of hunger. Hunger has a female face. It affects women disproportionately, and therefore it affects children as well, and it gets passed on inter-generationally, too.

The world is at a crossroads. Our generation may be the first in history with the knowledge, tools and resources to truly turn back the rising tide of hunger and misery.

Food security is not only a matter of humanitarian assistance and agricultural development; it is a matter of national security, peace and stability.

I believe we're living at a time in human history where it's just simply unacceptable that children wake up and don't know where to find a cup of food. Not only that, transforming hunger is an opportunity, but I think we have to change our mindsets … I would like you to join with all of humanity to draw a line in the sand and say, "No more. No more are we going to accept this." And we want to tell our grandchildren that there was a terrible time in history where up to a third of the children had brains and bodies that were stunted, but that exists no more.

Every 10 seconds we lose a child to hunger. This is more than HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis combined.

Seize the moment – don’t wait for anyone to give you permission.

With climate change and health crises rightfully receiving international attention, the time has come to focus on hunger as a top priority. WHO regards hunger and malnutrition as the gravest threat to public health, and climate change threatens to further destabilise already fragile food-production systems.

Food is one issue that cannot be solved person by person. We have to stand together.

If any good comes out of the current famine in the Horn of Africa - amidst the pictures of mothers carrying dying babies at their shrivelled breasts and hollow-eyed children with swollen bellies and matchstick limbs - it will be galvanising the world on the need to ensure access to nutritious food for the world's most vulnerable people.

One cup of food a day changes Fabian's life completely. But this morning, about a billion people on Earth - or one out of every seven - woke up and didn't even know how to fill this cup. One out of every seven people.

This isn't one of those rare diseases that we don't have the solution for. We know how to fix hunger.