By addressing both prevention and treatment, the CNF bridges critical gaps in nutrition services, ultimately saving lives and building resilience in vulnerable communities. The CNF aims to reach 320 million children and women annually with life-changing nutrition programmes.
As the Bezos family recognizes that the first 1,000 days of a child’s life are the most critical for brain development, and access to adequate nutrition is essential to fostering that development, they announced their intention to donate up to US$500 million to UNICEF USA for the CNF.
“The need is so great that no one alone can meet the urgent nutrition needs of the world’s women and kids. But we want to accelerate the change and invite others to join us in donating to the CNF. We will match each dollar donated to the CNF up to US$500 million,” said Mike Bezos. “The need is now. But we have the solutions now, too. In the CNF, we have the tools to meaningfully improve the nutrition and lives of women and children globally. We just need to band together to do it immediately.”
The historic commitment of up to half a billion dollars – announced at the Nutrition for Growth (N4G) Summit in Paris today – will kickstart a match-funding mechanism to encourage other private and public donors to meet the immediate and critical nutritional needs of children and women worldwide.
Undernutrition of children and women remains a pervasive challenge globally, contributing to nearly half of all deaths in children under 5. An estimated 148 million children under 5 are affected by stunting, while 45 million more are affected by wasting, a life-threatening form of malnutrition where a child is too thin for their height.
“UNICEF is incredibly grateful to the Bezos family for this extraordinary contribution that will save the lives of millions of children,” said UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell. “It’s a powerful rallying call to address life-threatening undernutrition for children and women. The time to act is now. UNICEF calls on the global community to join this incredible effort and make a life-saving difference for children who need it most.”
We urge public and private sector donors to match this US$500 million commitment with bold contributions to the CNF because every child and mother deserves the chance to thrive. Donations received now will be eligible for the Bezos family’s matching challenge invitation.
Overview of CNF
The CNF is designed to support government-led efforts in a selected number of countries that carry some of the highest numbers and/or proportions of children under 5 years of age with waste.
As such, the CNF will support government-led efforts in countries that have developed operational roadmaps as part of the United Nations Secretary-General’s Global Action Plan (GAP) on Child Wasting. As of today, the GAP includes the following 23 countries: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Burkina, Faso, Burundi, Cambodia, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Haiti, Indonesia, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Timor-Leste and Yemen.
