By Amit Smotrich, Senior Policy and Advocacy Associate, InterAction  
 
The Chicago Council on Global Affairs and InterAction, in collaboration with the Senate Agriculture Committee, hosted a panel briefing on Tuesday, March 8. In celebration of International Women’s Day, the panel, “The Road to Success: Cross-cutting Nutrition Delivery in a Changing World,” centered on the role of women in agriculture and food security, and highlighted women’s empowerment as an important way to address malnutrition. Speakers included Shawn Baker, director of nutrition at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation; Marc Nosbach, Mozambique country director for CARE; and Margaret Zeigler, executive director for the Global Harvest Initiative. The panel was moderated by Lucy Sullivan, executive director for 1,000 Days.

By focusing on women and their role in food production and distribution, the panel concluded that we could have a compounding positive impact. Women are consistently excluded from decision making spaces, not viewed as equal players in food production, and not a priority in their own right for nutrition investments. Each of these factors presents a clear opportunity for addressing food insecurity and malnutrition, since investments in women have direct impacts on their children and families. Food security is an issue that has broad bipartisan support, as well as engagement from the NGO and business community. As the panel discussed, investment in women is imperative as the U.S. continues its efforts to address food security and nutrition globally.