Join Thousands against Hunger at #BigIF in Hyde Park!

The other day my 4-year-old tossed his apple on the ground because he wanted a banana instead.

I hit him (verbally) with the full weight of my disapproval including that age-old, ‘back home in Africa, kids are starving’ lecture that bored us growing up.

The scary thing is that this story isn’t something our parents made up to terrify us into eating our peas.

Fact: More than 2 million children worldwide die of hunger every year.

Imagine your child’s nursery or primary school class (ours have max 60) then multiply this by thousands upon thousands, and you still wouldn’t get a clear picture of how shocking this number is.

‘Do you care about world hunger? Then get up out of your seat and do something about it!’

This was the rallying cry of Joy, an impassioned and funny activist from Kenya who spoke at the Action Aid Blogger Meet Up earlier this week.

Joy gave a heartfelt and moving account of her first-hand experiences of people in her community dying because of access to basic life needs, particularly food.

Fact: There is enough food in this world to feed everyone on the planet. Yet 1 in 8 people don’t have enough to eat.

At the event, we also heard from former Cold Feet actress and food writer Fay Ripley about what food means to her and about why she and her family decided to forgo lavish birthdays and sponsor a child through Action Aid instead.

The Action Aid Blogger Meet Up, involving several food, lifestyle and parenting bloggers, was an evening of discussion about how we can get involved in the Enough Food IF campaign.

3 Things I Love about the Enough Food IF campaign

1. More than 200 charities and international aid organisations are joining forces to end global hunger. This is groundbreaking stuff.

2. Africans are at the forefront of this campaign, from Graca Michel (Mandela’s wife) and singer Angelique Kidjo who are appearing in Hyde Park, to the grassroots African activists telling their stories including at a roundtable on Saturday.

3. The campaign focuses on Making a Joyful Noise and a Positive Difference, by Empowering local communities to help themselves and tackling 4 key issues that could affect millions worldwide. The IF message is fun and focused — it’s not about images of starving kids covered in flies!

Read more about the Enough Food IF campaign and the 4 Big IFs that could end world hunger!

COME TO THE BIG IF RALLY IN HYDE PARK ON SATURDAY

Bring your friends and loved ones along to Hyde Park this Saturday for what promises to be a historic day out. The Big IF will see thousands of people from all over coming to make our voices heard, including famous faces like Graca Michel (Mandela’s wife), Bill Gates, Angelique Kidjo, former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, Beardyman and Myleene Klass.

We are demanding that David Cameron and the G8 summit leaders take action now to tackle the causes of global hunger.

The Big IF is a family-friendly event with activity tents for kids, crafts, storytellers, musicians, inspirational speakers ad a Make IF Happen area with busking, spoken word and fun photo ops.

All visitors are invited to make a spinning flower to add to a giant spinning flower icon symbolising the millions of children who die from hunger each year.

I’ll be taking the boys along and I hope to see you there!

Big IF is happening this Saturday Jun 8 from 2-5pm in Hyde Park, W2 (Hyde Park Corner tube)

Visit enoughfoodif.org, follow @EnoughIF on Twitter and/or like www.facebook.com/Enoughfoodif