Good food. Good friends. Good for the future.

Growing children need healthy food to do well in school. Yet 14% of children in America don’t get more than one meal a day. Having an empty stomach makes it difficult to concentrate on schoolwork. And many families in urban areas live in food deserts, where fresh produce, meats and dairy are difficult to get.

That’s why 17-year-old Abby Yoon founded the Sustainable Hunger Initiative. One of her first projects was a community garden.

A garden is a good place to get an up-close relationship with the food we eat. Vegetables and fruit need daily nurturing. In turn, they give us the nutrients we need to thrive.

Yoon’s garden has provided over 3,000 pounds of food to local family centers and soup kitchens. Her group has arranged with farmers and ranchers to donate more than 45,000 pounds of locally raised beef. She also offers nutrition and cooking demonstrations, because part of eating a good meal is knowing how to prepare it.

Yoon’s goal is to “be the one person who empowers more people to act in their own communities.” She believes in getting her hands dirty in the garden, so people have fresh produce, but also in teaching others to grow their own gardens. “The community garden can serve as a medium for nutrition education,” Yoon says.

Growing and living a healthy lifestyle also means getting enough physical exercise. Yoon and her volunteers get plenty of cardio work in the garden, but many children don’t have the opportunity to get out and play. Yoon meets their needs by overseeing a fitness program that partners with the nutrition side. Her organization has donated more than 600 bicycles and oversees fitness programs for over 7,500 youth.

Yoon is all about making a difference. What she loves most is when others are inspired to do the same. So far, 10,000 volunteers have given their time to the community garden. After all, it is their community, and having fresh food on their tables is a dream come true. It all started with a 17-year-old girl who had a dream, a shovel and her feet planted firmly in her community.

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