Addressing Hunger Together: Submit Your Ideas for the Next Impact Labs

Food is more than nutrition. It’s medicine, it serves as critical fuel for our bodies and minds, and it provides comfort and a sense of safety. Access to food is more than a biological imperative, it affects our ability to learn, grow, connect, and thrive. That’s why hunger is such a complex and urgent issue. With 690 million people dealing with hunger — nearly nine percent of the global population — the impacts of inequitable access to food and nutrition have a ripple effect that reaches every corner of society.

Unfortunately, the causes of hunger are as complex and varied as the results. Climate change, war and conflict, and food waste are all major drivers of food insecurity. As a result, while we produce more food than ever before, one in nine people still go hungry, and two billion people don’t get access to nutritious food. These complex barriers need to be considered to reach the UN Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) of Zero Hunger — and we need your input on where to focus first.

To address these challenges, the connection between technology and community is critical. While many organizations are working on the problem, no one individual, government agency, nonprofit, or school can solve it on their own. The obstacles we face do not exist in silos, and neither do the answers.

To date, Salesforce.org Impact Labs has rallied our community around housing and homelessness, equity in education, and climate justice to find ways technology can help amplify and expedite the vital work of those trying to eradicate these global problems. Results of Impact Labs have included resources like the award-winning Financial Aid Chatbot, which helps create a more equitable experience around applying for financial aid, and Service Match to help case managers streamline referrals for services to help people experiencing homelessness.

Not only do these cohorts — which have been made up of individuals from organizations like The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Greenpeace, Compass Family Services, College Forward, Exponent Partners, and many more — come up with solutions, but they also expand our collective understanding of how to approach these problems through collaboration and technology. The voices in the room intentionally represent a diverse subset of cross-sector expertise.

The only way to get to an effective, sustainable solution is by bringing together these diverse voices in a space that allows for creativity, innovation, and risk taking. That’s why we are extending this open call for challenges to help shape the direction of the Zero Hunger Impact Lab.

We know that a number of solutions and programs exist today to help combat hunger. The goal with this Impact Lab is to complement those solutions, and amplify their impact through technology. We invite you — our community of nonprofits, schools, partners, and employees — to submit the issues preventing food security that we can address together. Your input will shape the direction of this next Impact Lab, ensuring that we’re investing time, technology, and talent on the areas with the highest potential for impact.

Addressing hunger might seem like a lofty goal, but at Salesforce.org, we’ve seen just how far the combination of powerful technology and purpose-driven individuals and organizations can take us.

Submissions close May 31, 2022. Multiple submissions allowed and encouraged.

About the Author

Amy Guterman
Senior Director, Community Innovation at Salesforce.org

As a human-centered designer and innovator, Amy believes in the power of design and technology to create positive change in the world. At Salesforce.org, her team leads Impact Labs and Open Source Commons to foster community collaboration and inspire innovation on the world’s most pressing challenges.

Prior to Salesforce, Amy led innovation teams for clients ranging from Fortune 500 companies to social sector organizations to identify new products and service offerings. Her work has been featured in publications such as Forbes, FastCo, Wired, and The Verge and recognized internationally by The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and The White House.