Childhood hunger is more complex than previously understood, new research suggests, and is unlikely to be solved simply by spending more money for food programs.

If Obama intends to erase childhood hunger, the government will need to reach even further into the rowhouse kitchen where Anajyha Wright Mitchell sometimes takes tiny portions so her mother will have more food.

A recent article in The Times by Jason DeParle and Robert Gebeloff detailed the effects of the soaring dependence on government food stamps in the United States.

One in eight Americans now gets food stamps. One in eight. Among American children, one of every four.

Food stamp use surged under President George W. Bush. In the economic crisis of the past year, it has exploded. All over the country.

We need policies that create jobs and meet the real needs of our nation. Expanding food stamp eligibility has a double impact. It puts food on the table for a struggling family who receives the food stamps, and food on the table for workers who got jobs producing and selling food. It is a win for working families, and a win for our economy.

The National School Lunch Program (NSLP) and School Breakfast Program (SBP) provide nutritious and affordable meals to all children. If you are applying for unemployment compensation, your children might be eligible to receive free or reduced price nutrition benefits under these school meal programs.

Prentice Jones worked construction jobs around Chicago for most of his 60 years and is quick to boast of a foreman job he once held at a revamped city college and 23 years at a steel company.

But these days, work has been so scarce that the man with a penchant for cowboy hats has been forced to move in with his mother and do something this week he never expected — visit a food pantry.

“NPR

A Program Once Scorned

With millions of jobs lost and major industries on the ropes, America’s array of government aid — including unemployment insurance, food stamps and cash welfare — is being tested as never before.

Half of American kids will live in households receiving food stamps before age 20, according to a study reported Monday in Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine.

Although one in five children rely on food stamps for years, many more live in families who turn to food stamps during a short-term crisis, says author Mark Rank of Washington University in St. Louis.

In a rare move, Congress has used a one-year extension of child nutrition programs as a down payment on future program enhancements. Two thousand nine was to be the year that key programs under the Child Nutrition Act – school lunch, school breakfast, WIC, child care feeding and more – would be reauthorized.

Nutrition, food stamp and dairy aid programs were among the winners as the House on Wednesday approved a $121 billion agriculture spending bill for the 2010 budget year.

Reflecting the growing number of people scrambling to get by in tough economic times, the bill provides $58.2 billion for the food stamp program, a jump of $4.3 billion from last year.

Similarly, the federal nutrition progra