International experts validate Dominican Republic’s advances in hunger reduction

Santo Domingo.- President Luis Abinader and Vice President Raquel Peña attended a keynote address this Wednesday by Brazilian economist José Graziano da Silva, a global reference in hunger eradication policies, who praised the Dominican Republic’s progress in food security and highlighted the country’s school feeding program as a model with proven social and economic impact.

Speaking at the National Palace, Graziano—former director general of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)—commended the Dominican strategy of public procurement from local producers and family farming, noting that it improves child nutrition and learning while stimulating rural economies. He stressed that guaranteeing the right to adequate food requires fairer, more resilient, and sustainable food systems, and warned about the growing consumption of ultra-processed foods at the expense of fresh, locally produced products.

Graziano’s visit, part of an institutional agenda running from February 16 to 22, supports efforts to strengthen the national strategy to eradicate hunger. During the event, Minister of the Presidency José Ignacio Paliza reported that undernourishment fell to 3.6% in 2025, a historic low that places the Dominican Republic below the regional average and on track to exit the global hunger map before 2028.

Paliza explained that nearly half a million Dominican families have overcome hunger in recent years through policies combining economic growth, wage increases, social protection, and support for national production. Key measures include a 20% increase in the non-sectorized private-sector minimum wage, the expansion of the Supérate program—reaching about 1.5 million households through the “Aliméntate” card—and the growth of Economic Dining Halls from 35 to 134 nationwide.

He also noted that 90.6% of food consumed in the country is produced locally and that more than two million students receive 70% of their daily nutritional needs through the School Feeding Program.