Interview with Senior Director, Jim Goodman
The biggest hunger issue in the world isn’t famine emergencies — it’s chronic malnutrition. Basically, it’s people living in extreme poverty and extreme hunger conditions, day after day, all the time.
As many of the MUNCH community know, The Hunger Project was one of the initial inspirations behind the MUNCH project and the concept of financial protocols being able to take a ‘bite’ from global issues.
Hunger is such an all-encompassing issue that has a debilitating effect on people, yet it can be prevented. By re-imagining how wealth and resources are distributed in the world, we can go beyond helping the people suffering from hunger, and be part of a future where hunger is a thing of the past.
The Hunger Project aims to create a ‘Mindset Shift’ through its work. They start action with a ‘women first’ approach as, throughout history, women have been marginalized, subjugated — treated as “less than”. On the flip side, when women have a voice and equality at every level — from household to community to government — they influence resources toward the wellbeing of children and families. Empowerment that begins with women acts as a wellspring throughout the rest of the community.
Once women are engaged in the process, The Hunger Project mobilizes communities and brings in local governments to ensure change and development take hold and benefit future generations.
We spoke to senior director, Jim Goodman to learn more about the work being done by The Hunger Project and what a partnership with MUNCH would be used for:
Can you introduce yourself and your role at The Hunger Project?
Well, I was a year out of law school when someone told me about The Hunger Project (THP). I became an “investor” — that’s what we call our donors — right away. Over the years I learned more about the work and the issues, and eventually, I made a big leap — I left a high-paying legal career to join THP staff full-time as a major gift fundraiser. As I like to say, they offered me an 80% pay cut, so I jumped on it! In my role, I talk to people about what matters to them in their lives, their highest ideals for the planet — and I invite them to become partners with our mission by investing their resources in a meaningful way. It doesn’t feel like work for me. It’s more like inviting people to join a revolution, changing the world.
What is the mission behind The Hunger Project?
The biggest hunger issue in the world isn’t famine emergencies — it’s chronic malnutrition. Basically, it’s people living in extreme poverty and extreme hunger conditions, day after day, all the time. Believe it or not, even now in the 21st century, thousands of people die every day from chronic malnutrition — and the vast majority of them are children and babies. Our mission is simple but huge: Eradicate chronic hunger from the planet, once and for all.
What projects and goals are you working on this year and how do you measure their impact?
Wow, there’s so much going on — I’m not sure where to start. This year we will continue partnering with rural African communities who are mobilizing for self-reliance. We’ll start that journey in some places, and we’ll witness the celebration of self-reliance in others. We’ll work with teenage girls in India who are challenging early childhood marriage and domestic violence. In Mexico, local leaders will expand their efforts to construct rain catchment systems in rural communities. I could go on and on! And everywhere we work, we employ state-of-the-art methods for evaluating our impact and learning from mistakes — that’s essential if you’re serious about being successful in this area.
In fact, with support from people like you in the MUNCH community, we’re accelerating our efforts.
Is eradicating hunger and starvation an achievable goal?
Absolutely! We’ve been championing the idea that hunger can be ended since our founding in 1977, and I’m happy to tell you that as of the early 2000s all of the UN member nations had gotten on board. As of 2015 we essentially cut extreme hunger and poverty in half on our planet. How cool is that??
And after that achievement, the UN members came together to commit to fully eradicating extreme hunger by 2030 by signing on to the Sustainable Development Goals, or SDGs. The COVID pandemic has slowed our forward progress on that commitment, but we aren’t giving up. In fact, with support from people like you in the MUNCH community, we’re accelerating our efforts.
How do you start to tackle hunger at a systemic level?
Ending hunger starts with people. That might sound obvious, but for decades experts in our field thought that the most important breakthroughs would be in the area of agriculture or technology. Don’t get me wrong — those issues are important. But at THP we recognized early on that the single greatest leverage point for ending hunger sustainably is the engagement and leadership of the people themselves. That’s why we say that people living in hunger aren’t a problem to be solved — they are the solution. When women and girls are valued and given a voice, when communities are mobilized to take ownership of their development process, when local government is brought in to partner with communities in their success — all the right things happen to bring about sustainable forward progress.
How will donations contribute to this mission?
Investing in people has huge payoffs. We don’t ship food to people. We don’t give handouts. We work through local staff, and our local staff mobilizes volunteer leaders in rural villages. As a result, we get a huge bang for the buck. Instead of asking how much of a dollar goes to programs, we think in terms of the multiplier effect of each dollar invested in our partners in low-income countries. Donations from the MUNCH community will literally change the future for thousands of people in every region of the world where chronic hunger persists. Investing in the end of persistent hunger is a radical act.
How did you first learn about the MUNCH project?
I got an email out of the blue from MUNCH’s Pete Martin asking if we accepted cryptocurrency. At the same time, a leadership consultant we were working with suggested I check out this really cool organization — MUNCH.
For me it was like flipping a switch — overnight I went from being a crypto skeptic to being intrigued and open to the idea. And then I met (virtually) with Pete and with Matt Howarth, and my “conversion” was complete — I was completely inspired by what they told me about the MUNCH community and by their energy and enthusiasm to channel crypto toward making a difference in the world. I carried their enthusiasm into conversations I had with my colleagues and our leadership team, and everyone quickly got on board.
What was your experience with cryptocurrencies and blockchain projects before this?
I had met with a few folks who were actually major players in the crypto world — and I have to say I couldn’t make any sense of it. So we were at a zero when we first encountered MUNCH — and now we’re embracing it 1000%.
What advice would you give to other charities considering implementing a crypto-based donation model?
Don’t wait!!! Don’t be like the charities 20 years ago who thought their donors would never engage with them on those newfangled “computers.”
What are the next steps for The Hunger Project?
We will continue to combine our 40+ years of experience on the ground with agility and openness to discovering the next high-leverage actions to accelerate our work to eradicate hunger from the planet. With new large-scale partnerships and with funding from individuals and organizations like the MUNCH community, we’re excited about what the future will look like — for all of us around the world.
Thank you to Jim and The Hunger Project — if you want to select The Hunger Project as the next cause to support, cast your vote here.
