This may not seem like an issue to attack in a post on hunger, but I think it is vital for domestic issues of hunger: the poor are not just going hungry, they're being malnourished.
Undernourished and malnourished are different things. Undernourished is a lack of calories. Malnourished is the wrong calories, or the wrong balance of nutrients.
Our children in poor communities are being malnourished, in part, because healthy food isn't available. If you aren't in a suburb with a car to get to the big supermarket, your access to fresh produce and non-packaged food is limited. In the country, of course, you can grow your own. In the city, many people are left with just the corner convenience store. How healthy can it be to eat every meal out of convenience store choices? Not to mention expensive . . .
Add to this the ubiquitous cheap fast food with low nutritional value to match the low price, and the poor choices available in many school cafeterias, and the parents who don't know how to cook from basic ingredients . . . you get poverty leading to malnourishment, with or without undernourishment. NYC is doing something about this. It might be a good idea for other cities to consider similar actions.
Until then, let's push for farmer's markets and neighborhood grocery stores, for healthy school lunches and nutritional training as part of development strategies. That may help end one of the less visible hunger effects of poverty.
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