U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand has announced her ideas for improving nutrition and addressing food insecurity ahead of the 2023 Farm Bill.
More than 33 million people in the United States live in households that are food insecure, with roughly 2.9 million people in New York relying on Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits.
Gillibrand’s priorities to combat food insecurity and increase access to nutritious meals in the Farm Bill include strengthening SNAP benefits, expanding the SNAP program to people living in Puerto Rico, and ensuring disadvantaged populations always have a pathway to food.
Gillibrand’s announcement follows her questioning of USDA officials at a Senate Agriculture Committee hearing where she pushed experts on the importance of maintaining adequate SNAP benefits, improving the SNAP Employment & Training program, improving the Healthy Food Financing Initiative, and more.
With the current legislation set to expire on September 30, 2023, Congress is working to draft a new, five-year Farm Bill with congressional hearings already underway to determine public and private stakeholders’ priorities for the reauthorization.
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