August 21, 2019

Witnesses to Hunger member Tianna Gaines-Turner spoke out about causes of and solutions for food insecurity as part of WURD 96.1 FM’s show Reality Check on August 15, with radio host Charles Ellison. 

Ellison featured Turner along with Jamila Taylor, PhD, Director of Health Care Reform and Senior Fellow of the Century Foundation. They discussed several topics including the impact of budget cuts on food insecure families, the repercussions of hunger and poverty on child development, barriers to finding affordable healthy food, the role of systemic racism in creating food insecurity and the most feasible solutions for addressing food insecurity. Turner drew upon her own experience as both a mother and political advocate in offering insight.

“We put a face to the numbers,” Turner said in explaining Witnesses to Hunger’s goal of speaking about the experience of hunger and poverty. 

This mission is important to Turner because many experiencing food insecurity do not visibly present that way, making it largely unseen. By humanizing the data, she hopes to educate her community, promote grassroots food movements and bring light to the silent hunger that many children face on a regular basis.

WURD is Philadelphia’s only African-American owned talk radio station and seeks to educate and inspire Philadelphia’s African-American community by providing information and solutions to relevant community problems. Ellison is currently hosting a series called EcoWURD Food Lab, which airs on Thursdays at 6 p.m. and explores sustainable solutions to food insecurity.

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