By Carlos Rodriguez, SIAP DevCom Intern

In line with Sustainable Development Goal #2: Zero Hunger, the Social Involvement and Advocacy Program (SIAP) held XU HUKAD: Help for Undernourished Kids’ Abilities and Development 2024, a feeding program for malnourished Grade 2 students at Bulua Central School (BCS) from 19 March to 23 May 2024.

While Bulua Central School already has an existing feeding program through Republic Act 11037, also known as the Masustansyang Pagkain Para Sa Batang Pilipino Act, SIAP’s HUKAD initiative considers itself a more holistic approach to addressing severe acute malnutrition among students. HUKAD provides lunch to over 60 students for 40 days.

HUKAD beneficiaries from Bulua Central School pray for grace for their meals.

HUKAD 2024 aimed to serve Grade 2 students classified as 'severely wasted.' With the help of BCS staff, a system was established to identify these students. “Every year ga timbang mi sa bata, ga sukod mi sailang height, kuhaon dayon namo ilang nutrition status through their BMI,” (Every year, we measure the children’s weight and height, and we then determine their nutrition status through their BMI) explained Joan Luconan, BCS Representative for HUKAD, in an interview. This was not the first HUKAD event. The inaugural XU HUKAD was launched on 13 March 2023 in partnership with the XU National Service Training Program (NSTP) and BCS.

XU SIAP with their partners from Bulua Central School and Ateneo Diplomatic Corps.

This year, SIAP partnered with the Ateneo Diplomatic Corps for their “Turning Miles Into Meals: Color Fun Run” held on 18 February 2024. Proceeds from the fun run were donated to the feeding program.

Nestor Banuag Jr, Director of SIAP, hopes that monitoring will continue as these students transition to the 3rd grade. SIAP remains committed to addressing Zero Hunger and looks forward to future partnerships to help more beneficiaries through this project.