Getting food

Look through this album to see how children around the world get their food.
What are the problems they face not getting enough food?
What helps them get the good food that they need?

Fatsani

Dilsia

Somphet

Ivy

Charmaine

Ivy (5 years old) in Zambia

Ivy shows the cabbage her family grew in their garden. World Vision gave sponsored children like Ivy packets of vegetable seeds to plant and look after. They learned new skills like making compost to make sure the plants grow well. The children like helping in the garden knowing that the food they grow will become something good to eat for dinner.

Al Amin in Bangladesh

I am six years old. My mother works hard to look after my brother and me. But since I was a baby I haven't had enough food and I was hungry a lot. Sometimes we only ate one meal a day so I didn't grow very well. A year ago, we got help from World Vision and they gave us extra food. My mother learnt how to cook healthy food that doesn't cost much. I wake up at six in the morning and eat rice with spinach. I like apples but I haven't had one for a long time.

Dilsia in East Timor

Dilsia is five years old. She is at the World Vision nutrition centre being weighed and measured. Her mother goes to classes where she learns how to prepare nutritious meals using local food that is cheap and easy to get. She tries to feed her children three times a day but they don't have rice very often. Dilsia is 94.5 centimetres tall and weighs 12 kilogrammes. Her upper arm measures 11.4 centimetres around it. This means she is still not getting enough of the right food but she is much healthier than she used to be.

Grace in Swaziland

Grace is in her first year at primary school. She came to school hungry because her mother was too sick to cook meals. Grace was hungry and couldn't concentrate so the teacher let her sleep. Fortunately her school has a lunchtime feeding programme where she'll get a cooked meal. Many schools have started feeding programmes to help children who come to school hungry.

Tchaona (13 years old) in Zimbabwe

When I was hungry I spent the day at home, not doing anything. I felt as if I was sick. I missed two days of school. My father doesn't have enough money. We don't have livestock. There was no rain last year so our crops wouldn't grow. At my school's feeding programme I like to eat beans and barley. It gives me power in my writing.

Charmaine (7 years old) in Zimbabwe

Before I could not stand the taste of the wild fruits we eat called masau. But now there is nothing else to eat, I appreciate them. I used to be quite choosy not eating many things, but now I eat anything. Whatever my parents provide, I just eat whether I enjoy it or not. These days we only have an evening meal. During the day we have to eat masau fruit and drink lots of water.

Fatsani (9 years old) in Malawi

Fatsani is in Year 5 at school. After school he uses this treadle pump to bring water from swampy ground through pipes onto the maize crop (like corn). When he steps on the boards the bicycle chain moves the plungers that pump water through the pipes. His family grows two or three maize crops a year, instead of one, because they can water their fields even when there's not much rain. They have plenty of food.

Selloane (5 years old) in Lesotho

Often we eat twice instead of three times a day. Sometimes I'm hungry and there's no food at home. When we don't have food, I go to my relatives' house to eat. My mum sends me. I don't know why the ground is so dry. When it rains, I like to play in the rain. But I can't remember now when it rained last.

Somphet (seven years old) in Lao

Somphet works with others from his village planting rice. Rice grows in paddy fields that are flooded with water. A year ago the villagers built a dam using wire cages of rocks to get water from a nearby creek into their rice fields. The extra water means they can grow two crops a year. Now everyone has enough food. Their health is better and the children can go to school every day.

Nomusa (12 years old) in Zimbabwe

Because of hunger, I was unable to learn well in class. I wished that I could get better grades but I would often faint as I was feeling weak. My teacher would give me two biscuits and give me some time to recover outside of class. I would miss out on some lessons and then when the tests came I didn't do very well. I also had no energy to play with the other children at break time, even though I wanted to play. What made me more sad was that other children didn't want to play with me because they thought I was sick. When World Vision started to bring us food here at school, all this changed. My grades improved and I came sixth in class instead of 31st. Now I have all the energy to play with friends at break time after we eat our food and I'm not lonely anymore.