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  • Everything Starts Here...

It Starts With a Meal®

TAKE ACTION TODAY TO END HUNGER TOMORROW. It starts with a meal. It leads to resilience, self-sufficiency, education, empowerment and bright futures in communities worldwide.

EDUCATION STARTS WITH A MEAL

We launched our It Starts With a Meal® movement to share that the journey toward self-reliance and bright futures begins with a single nutritious meal. Our work starts with a meal — but it doesn’t end there. We’re sharing stories of impact in Kenya through the Feed for Knowledge project led by Rise Against Hunger and Rural Family Hope to improve access to nutrition, quality education, clean water and agriculture training that helps to ensure long-term food security for communities in Kenya.

RECOVERY STARTS WITH A MEAL

In early 2022, Ukraine faced a refugee crisis due to ongoing conflict. In response to the crisis, we provided thousands of nourishing meal kits and supplies to those affected and displaced from their homes in collaboration with Rise Against Hunger Italia and other global partners. Meal kits contained pulses, grains, pasta, oil, dried fruit, canned goods, fruit juice, pre-packaged snacks, and baby food.

OPPORTUNITY STARTS WITH A MEAL

Michael, age 42, is a rice farmer living with his wife and two children in Malawi’s Karonga district, a participant of in the Harvesting Prosperity and Resilience project, implemented in Malawi through a partnership with Rise Against Hunger and FOCUS. The project works to enhance the food and nutrition security of smallholder farmers in Malawi’s Karonga and Mzimba districts by improving food production, nutrition practices and incomes. With five kilograms of rice seed that he received through the project, Michael harvested 2,000 kilograms of rice and was then able to sell some of his harvests, earning the equivalent of $583. He plans to cultivate more land this year to increase his harvest even more. With dreams of being a role model in his village, he believes that his increased rice crop will enable that dream to become a reality.

  • Meet Program Participants in Kenya

Nourishing Lives One Meal at a Time

As participants in the Feed for Knowledge project, led by Rise Against Hunger and Rural Family Hope, the impact goes beyond a meal. It starts with a meal, and it leads to nourishment, quality education, access to clean water and sustainable, lasting, long-term food security for children and their families in Kenya. Meet the incredible program participants below to see firsthand the impact YOU made possible.

Monthly Giving

Team Nourish is a community of monthly supporters helping create consistent access to nutrition, education and opportunity for children and families around the world. Just $30 a month can help provide the resources communities need to build brighter futures.

Join Team Nourish and be part of lasting impact every month.

  • Sponsored By:

Red Star Yeast

Take part in the #itstartswithameal global effort on social!
It Starts With a Meal® is supported by a $50,000 donation
from campaign sponsor, Red Star Yeast.
JOIN US ON INSTAGRAM

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.