School-Feedings Archives - Meds & Food For Kids

MFK CEO Spotlights Local Solutions for School Children

Melissa George — Mon, 27 Oct 2025 13:36:36 +0000

MFK CEO Chris Greene Joins International Experts to Spotlight Locally Driven School Feeding

At the 2025 World Food Prize Foundation’s Norman E. Borlaug International Dialogue, Chris Greene, CEO of Meds & Food for Kids, joined an international panel of experts to explore how localized development solutions can feed more of the world’s children.

The panel was titled: “Hunger Hotspots and the Humanitarian Development Nexus: Agricultural Research and School Feeding for Global Stability.”

Fellow panelists included:

Chris discussed the importance of locally driven, nutrition-sensitive approaches in humanitarian settings to strengthen both immediate and long-term solutions. Key points included:

Humanitarian aid is important in acute crises, but can create dependency if it persists without addressing underlying systemic issues. Locally sourced and produced solutions are critical to build resilience and sustainability.
Partnerships and collaboration are key to developing resilient, long-term solutions that build local capacity. Initiatives like school feeding programs can create critical infrastructure and support local economies.
Nuance, curiosity, and humility are needed to avoid assuming that solutions that work in one context will automatically translate to another. Addressing the complexity of these challenges requires comprehensive, multi-layered approaches.

“In fragile settings, the nexus of humanitarian aid and development is where we translate compassion into actual resilience,” Chris said. “We need to look at things like school meals as not just charity, but as the creation of the infrastructure that is needed for a better tomorrow.”

“Agriculture is not peripheral to peace. It is actually peace in motion. We need to pursue the policies and activities that actually achieve the outcomes children need,” he added.

“When we’re facing these complex problems, we need to acknowledge that they require comprehensive solutions, that they should be humanitarian when needed, always developmental by design and local at every level,” Chris concluded.

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2024: Record-Setting Year

Melissa George — Tue, 07 Jan 2025 10:00:00 +0000

Expanding Impact, Transforming Futures

2024 was a challenging year for Haiti. Half of the country’s population is at Crisis or higher levels of food insecurity, and more than 1 million Haitians are displaced due to ongoing violence.

At the same time, it was an impactful year for Meds & Food for Kids, setting records that give us hope for 2025.

We partnered with the World Food Program to expand work with more than 600 Haitian farmers, over half of which are women, to combat food insecurity in Haiti. This partnership allows us to triple the farmers trained annually, and this partnership will continue in the coming year. By training even more Haitian farmers to improve crop yields, we further strengthen food systems so more families can be fed.

Solar energy at the factory has reduced MFK’s carbon footprint by nearly 400 tons of CO2 emissions. Two years after installation, the transition to solar allows the MFK Haiti team to produce treatments without the worry of diesel availability. In October, our factory team set a production record of 19,000 treatments that month.

We celebrate Meds & Food for Kids reaching the ONE MILLION TREATMENTS milestone! More than one million malnourished children and mothers have been treated with therapeutic and supplemental foods produced in our Cap-Haitien factory! Our generous supporters and Haiti team made this achievement possible and we are so grateful.

Our 2024 accomplishments highlight the impact and power of localization. MFK’s dedicated Haiti team transforms futures for Haitian families and communities, and continues to work towards sustainable change for a stronger Haiti. Thank you for your support of their critical work!

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Celebrating Fellows’ Impact

Melissa George — Thu, 12 Dec 2024 19:03:53 +0000

Reflections from Dr. Pat Wolff, Meds & Food for Kids Founder

As we celebrate MFK treating 1 million children & mothers, I would like to acknowledge a group who made a huge difference along the way: the 46 expat fellows who worked with MFK for 1-3 years each from 2009 to 2020. Recent college graduates in North America and Europe shared what they learned about topics like food safety, agriculture, nursing, public health, and engineering. Except for agriculture and nursing, all of these areas of study were unavailable to the local Haitian people, even to those with higher education.

Each fellow accelerated steps toward success, but the impact was often not seen until after they had left Haiti. It was hard work; persistence was needed. The fellows collaborated with Haitians with generosity and kindness. I never doubted that the fellow’s contribution was appreciated by the people and communities they worked with. These fellows also learned a lot about the challenges of living in Haiti, and despite creature comfort challenges, everyone aimed to be their best selves and stayed focused on the mission.

A Bright Future in Haiti

In March of 2020, at the direction of the President of Haiti, the fellows were suddenly asked to leave the country because of the pandemic. The Haitian employees stepped up immediately. They soon realized that they had enough information and skills through their work with fellows over the years to perform all needed tasks. The Haitians filled all of MFK’s Haiti jobs, very confidently and professionally. MFK had always been working toward this goal but we did not imagine it would be accomplished so abruptly and so early.

Since the beginning, MFK has proudly promoted the achievements of Haitians. Today, I would like to also say how proud I am of the 46 expat fellows for their generosity, persistence and ability to choose hardship for the greater good of Haiti and Haitians. I give thanks for all of you and am proud to know each of you.

Dr. Pat Wolff

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Reflecting on 2023

Melissa George — Tue, 19 Dec 2023 09:00:00 +0000

Friends,

2023 is coming to a close, and as we reflect on the year we are proud to share some of Meds & Food for Kids’ key milestones:

This year was MFK’s 20th anniversary. Children saved in the organization’s early years are now young adults, whose talents would have been lost to malnutrition two decades ago without treatment.
Our factory in Haiti is now using solar energy instead of diesel. This has enabled MFK to produce more therapeutic foods with additional shifts, and so far has reduced over 211 tons of CO2 emissions.
In May MFK produced a record 15,000 treatments for severely malnourished children.
We hosted our first annual “Zero Hunger: Doing What Works” forum featuring author Roger Thurow discussing solutions for the global hunger crisis.
CEO Chris Greene and COO Remenson Tenor hosted the first MFK Zoom calls to share updates about the work in Haiti.‍

This is possible thanks to donors who support MFK’s work to save lives and transform futures.

Over 20 years, we have treated more than 900,000 malnourished children and mothers. Together, we can reach 1 million.

Thank you for an incredible 2023. We look forward to seeing what we can achieve together in 2024.

Mèsi anpil,
Chris Greene, CEO
Remenson Tenor, COO
Dr. Patricia Wolff, Founder

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