Sheila Jackson Lee: “As a senior Member of the House of Representatives and the founding chair of the Congressional Children's Caucus, I rise…”

“As a senior Member of the House of Representatives and the founding chair of the Congressional Children's Caucus, I rise in strong support of this bipartisan resolution, H. Res. 189, ``Recognizing the importance of sustained United States leadership to accelerating global progress against maternal and child malnutrition and supporting United States Agency for International Development's commitment to global nutrition through its multisectoral nutrition strategy.'' First and foremost, I would like to recognize and thank Congressmen Roger Marshall and Jim McGovern for their leadership on this vital resolution. By passing H. Res. 189 today, we are committing ourselves to improving the health of women and children in impoverished areas, helping prevent illness, and improving economic conditions in poorer countries. With that in mind, I wish to commend the U.S. Agency for International Development's (USAID) maternal and child nutrition programs that seek to improve health outcomes by implementing nutrition-specific interventions, or those that address the immediate, health-related determinants of undernutrition. These critical investments are closely coordinated with USAID's nutrition-sensitive interventions that address underlying or systemic causes of inadequate nutrition, such as education, water, sanitation, and hygiene, agriculture, as well as the healthy timing and spacing of pregnancy.…”