One in 9 people in the world doesn’t get enough to eat.

Peanut butter might be a staple on your breakfast table. PBJ’s are in fact very popular in the United States. A study once found out that the average American will have eaten one thousand, five hundred peanut-butter sandwiches before finishing high school. 
Peanut butter isn’t loved by all. Some people are allergic to peanuts and develop severe reactions when coming in contact with them. 

But for millions of people, especially children, a special form of peanut butter that contains added nutrients is actually a life saver. It is used as a therapeutic food, food that can heal from malnourishment.

Malnourishment means that a human body for a long time didn’t get the vitamins and minerals it needs to be healthy. For children under the age of five this is particularly devastating because they won’t grow properly, their brains won’t develop as they should, and they become sick and often die. In many places around the world, especially in parts of Asia and of Africa, families are so poor that they can’t afford nutritious food. Their village may have been hit by drought or flood that destroyed their harvests, their country may have been ravaged by war, or their farmland may have been used for crops like coffee or chocolate or cotton instead of planting grains, fruits and vegetables.

One in nine people in the world — mostly in developing countries — doesn’t get enough to eat or enough nutrients to be healthy. For many people, rice is their only regular meal; while this may stave off hunger, it lacks the protein, vitamins, and minerals necessary to stay healthy. 

When children aren’t well nourished their bodies and brains don’t develop properly and they are too weak to play, or too hungry to learn in school. 

Yet hunger and malnutrition can be overcome. There is actually enough food on our planet for everyone. If individuals, companies, organizations and governments work together they can ensure that every human has sustainable access to nourishing food. Distributing therapeutic food in form of peanut butter to developing countries is just one small step to fight the problem. Education, lending money to small farmers — especially to women and indigenous people — equal distribution of foods, providing access to clean water, predicting severe weather, and protecting ecosystems and biodiversity are other solutions to end hunger and malnutrition for good.