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Our Trip to the Philippines with Zambrero: Highlighting How the Work to End Hunger Starts With a Meal

  • Liza Munson

on  June 20, 2023

As Senior Manager of Strategic Global Corporate Partnerships at Rise Against Hunger, I recently had the opportunity to travel to the Philippines for an impact trip with representatives from Zambrero, one of our organization’s longstanding and largest corporate partners. In my role, I am passionate about bringing corporations and organizations alongside Rise Against Hunger to create meaningful impact together, and I’ve had the pleasure of working with Zambrero for years in the work to serve communities affected by food insecurity. Zambrero has been dedicated to our mission of ending global hunger since 2014 and through their Plate 4 Plate program Zambrero donates a meal for every burrito or bowl sold in its restaurants worldwide. This trip to the Philippines served as an opportunity for Zambrero team members to gain a deeper understanding of how the impact made possible by their support “starts with a meal” and to learn more about Rise Against Hunger’s global work, including our international offices. I, with another member of the Rise Against Hunger U.S. team, accompanied Zambrero as we visited several of the programs supported and managed by Rise Against Hunger Philippines. Keep reading to learn more about why this week-long impact trip with Zambrero was so impactful! We started the week-long impact trip in Manila, braving the infamous traffic as we traveled to the Kain Tayo Mobile Kitchen to distribute hot meals to community members. The mobile kitchen, run by Rise Against Hunger Philippines, is stationed two days a week in different barangays (districts) and serves approximately 500 community members at each stop. The experience was not what any of us expected! When we arrived, there was loud music playing and a festive atmosphere as women and children lined up to have their take-home containers filled with hot, nutritious food. The Zambrero team jumped right into the action, helping the Rise Against Hunger Philippines staff with serving the meals. At the mobile kitchen site, community members also can receive vaccines, seed packets to take home and other services. 

Zambrero Team members serving hot take-home meals at the Kain Tayo Mobile Kitchen
On day two, we visited Rise Against Hunger’s Good Food Farm and the nearby Bungkol Elementary School. Starting at the school, I experienced one of the most impactful moments of the trip while listening to an emotional and passionate message from a teacher there. The school receives Rise Against Hunger meals to serve to their students, and the teacher shared that she has personally witnessed changes in her students’ physical and emotional well-being since the introduction of the meals. The Zambrero team was also able to visit the school’s small garden, which engages parents and community members in the planting, maintenance and harvesting of fresh vegetables for the school and community. Hearing from the teacher and seeing the garden highlighted the work being done to address both the children’s immediate nutritional needs and work toward long-term food security.
Students at Bungkol Elementary
We then visited the Good Food Farm, an urban community farm established by Rise Against Hunger Philippines, and were able to walk around and see the grounds. The paradisiacal farm is working to alleviate hunger in the Philippines through sustainable agriculture. It grows organic produce for local food pantries and provides experiential education for the community about sustainable agriculture practices and food justice.
Zambrero team members with the mayor of Magdalena, Laguna Peter C. Bucal, and his wife at the Good Food Farm.
On the third day, we visited A Better World Tondo Food Bank. This was a memorable day for all of us. The facility is far more than just a food bank, and we could see the impact the nutritious food and other services provided by the facility were having in the community. The food bank is structured as a shop, with patrons able to come and take the food that they need from the shelves. There is also a state-of-the-art kitchen. We were there during lunch and saw local schoolchildren coming in for meals. The facility also has many other services, including a tutoring center and a health center. While there, we went in small groups to see the homes of some Better World Tondo volunteers to better understand their lives and living conditions. These home visits underscored the importance of the food bank and the impact it is having on people’s lives. As the week together with Zambrero began to come to a close, we went to Cebu to see a Rise Against Hunger meal distribution with the Simply Share Foundation. When we arrived, local children were lined up to receive Rise Against Hunger meals and other food products. The Philippines Navy and Marines were in attendance to help manage the distribution. Many of the homes we saw in Cebu were in poor condition, which served as a somber reminder of the challenges that people living in poverty face. 
Zambrero team members serving meals in Cebu
All of the programs we visited illustrated how “It Starts With a Meal” but doesn’t end there in the communities that Rise Against Hunger serves. The work to end hunger goes beyond just providing a meal right now; it also includes supporting long-term food security through sustainable agriculture, supporting education by providing school meals that improve well-being, increasing access to needed services and supplies, and so much more. The Zambrero team left the Philippines with an increased resolve to continue their incredible work to help end global hunger. It was wonderful to spend time with the Zambrero team, and I know that the experiences we shared during our trip to the Philippines are some that all of us will hold in our hearts forever. As one of the Zambrero franchise partners shared, “We totally underestimated how much we would learn on this trip. I always thought our Plate for Plate initiative was about a meal for a meal and it ended there. I had no idea how we are contributing to so much more. I couldn’t be more proud of it all.”  Interested in learning how your business or organization can partner with Rise Against Hunger — like Zambrero — to help global hunger? Learn more about how we can partner together and submit your interest here.

About the Author

Liza Munson is the Senior Manager of Strategic Global Corporate Partnerships at Rise Against Hunger.

Strength, Stability And Hope

The gift that filled Nelly’s table.

“We were yielding very little, and the crops could not sustain us the whole year,” Nelly remembers. As a mother of seven and a farmer with two decades of experience, the stress of inconsistent yields was all-consuming. A poor harvest not only strained her family financially, but also limited their own meals to just two a day. Their story reflects that of many in their fishing and farming village near a lake in the Karonga district of northern Malawi. Here, heavy rainfall makes conventional farming methods nearly impossible. The entire village is, quite literally, saturated in food insecurity — a reality that leaves families struggling to survive season after season without a dependable source of nourishment.

In 2019, Nelly began participating in Harvesting Prosperity and Resilience, a sustainable agriculture project implemented by Rise Against Hunger in partnership with the Foundation for Community Support Services (FOCUS). The project works with 3,100 smallholder farmers in Malawi’s Karonga and Mzimba districts to strengthen food and nutrition security by improving production methods, nutrition practices and household income.

Just one year later, Nelly was ready to expand the variety of crops on her farm. What land once only produced maize began to flourish with sesame, cowpeas, rice and groundnuts during the rainy season (summer), as well as maize and vegetables during the dry season (winter). Through climate-smart agriculture training, she learned new techniques like manure making, pit planting and mulching, crop rotation and intercropping. Equipped with these tools, Nelly’s farm began to thrive.

After the 2023–2024 growing season, she sold enough produce to purchase an ox cart. Her harvests in 2024-2025 season yielded over 500 pounds of crops, including 22 bags of groundnuts, seven bags of maize, 12 tins of sesame and three bags of rice. With this surplus, she was able to invest in a motorbike, which she now uses to transport African doughnuts (mandasi) that she cooks and sells — creating yet another source of income for her family.

The transformation reaches far beyond her finances. Nelly now has the stability to provide for her husband and children. “I am able to eat different food types, pay school fees for my children and fulfill the visions that I have made with my family,” she beams. “I am now sleeping peacefully without any fears of food or paying school fees for the children.”

Her leadership has also grown. Today, Nelly serves as a leader in the Harvesting Prosperity and Resilience project, teaching other farmers in her district to adopt climate-resilient, labor-saving practices. By sharing her knowledge, she is multiplying her impact — empowering her neighbors to experience the same transformation she has achieved.

Across Nelly’s community, food and economic security are on the rise. Lombani, a government extension officer for the region, explains, “I can see the community is being transformed in the sense that in the area, there is food, income and nutrition security. Development is also happening at the household level.”

Nelly reflects on what it means to invest in holistic programs that address the root causes of hunger: “We are now healthy people. Children are going to school after eating their breakfast, having high yields and different types of crops due to conservation agriculture practices. With the support from the project, we have food, and we can access other food items from the market after selling our produce.”

This is the gift that fills: a future full of stability, strength and hope. It fills tables with food, families with security and communities with the resources to thrive. It’s an investment in futures rooted in resilience and hope.