Following the historic 2022 White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health, CSPI committed to investing $1.5 million in community partnership as part of the White House Challenge to End Hunger and Build Healthy Communities. Here’s our progress.  

Two years ago, President Biden hosted the first-ever White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health. On that day, the Biden administration put forth a national strategy composed of 196 federal government commitments to reduce hunger and diet-related disease. Alongside these commitments, the White House issued its own challenge, a call to action to stakeholders across the nation to join this goal to end hunger, reduce health disparities, and reduce diet-related diseases by 2030.

CSPI took on this challenge. CSPI committed to investing $1.5 million in partnerships with community-based organizations led by people most impacted by food system inequities.  

In 2024 to date, CSPI and our affiliate organization, CSPI Action Fund, have disbursed over $2 million to 26 organizations. Half of our partners are led by people from communities most impacted by food system inequities.

We are honored to partner with organizations around the country that are positively impacting their communities to address food system inequities. We’d like to highlight the work of just a few below:

• In Louisiana, Sankofa CDC strengthened community power by organizing the Sankofa Community Action Advisory Board (CAAB), bringing together a coalition of community members based in New Orleans’ Lower Ninth Ward.    
• In Maryland, aimed at improving the quality and healthfulness of food in carceral settings, PG Changemakers interviewed and surveyed formerly incarcerated community members, and reported on their findings in the publication Food in Jails Should Heal Not Harm.
• In New York, the Muslim Community Network, a subgrantee of the Interfaith Public Health Network, advocated for various food labeling and marketing bills and participated in a Lobby Day in Albany. Over the summer, they helped secure seven new co-sponsors to support the NYC Kids Meals bill, which at present has a supermajority of sponsors on the city council. This bill could pass as early as January 2025.
• In California, at the NAACP state conference, the Equity Alliance Group & Professional Resource Associates proposed a healthy checkout resolution, which was approved to be added to the national convention agenda. This elevates an important policy opportunity to a national scope with the NAACP.  

CSPI also made a commitment to build out a network of diverse researchers and to make research and advocacy reports more accessible. In 2024, CSPI has published eight peer-reviewed articles, four (50 percent) of which were published in open-access journals. Our work has laid the foundation for future partnerships with researchers from Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs) through collaboration on funding proposals.

From coast to coast, CSPI and the CSPI Action Fund have met and cultivated relationships with partners who work to lift up the most vulnerable people in their communities. We’re honored to work alongside them, and we’re excited to continue doing the work to meet the challenge posed by the White House two years ago.