Seville, Spain, June 30, 2025 // Tonight, as global leaders sat down for a dinner hosted by the King of Spain, 733 million people will be going to bed hungry. On the eve of the fourth UN Financing for Development Conference (FfD4), the Hungry for Action coalition lit up Seville landmarks with powerful projections, exposing the escalating global hunger crisis and demanding urgent action on nutrition financing. The striking images, beamed onto iconic city landmarks including the CaixaForum, posed an urgent question aimed at delegates: “Who do you serve?,” a challenge demanding immediate action on the worsening global hunger emergency.
This latest activation of the #EmptyPlates campaign is a reminder that hunger is human made, a political choice, and therefore a solvable problem. Each empty plate urges FfD4 negotiators to treat hunger and malnutrition as central to the future of development financing, and to ensure the summit delivers real outcomes for communities on the frontline of the climate, conflict and cost of living crises.
Despite 733 million people going to bed hungry every night and the world producing enough food to feed the world’s population twice over, nutrition received just 0.37% of all overseas development assistance (ODA) in 2022. The cost of this inaction is staggering: 6.2 million preventable child deaths, $3.5 trillion lost from the global economy every year, and $41 trillion in potential costs over the next decade. With the massive ODA cuts in 2025 still yet to be fully realised, the anticipated 44% cut to global nutrition funding could result in an additional 369,000 child deaths each year from severe acute malnutrition.
“The world is watching Seville. This summit must not become yet another missed opportunity,” said Paul Newnham from the Hungry for Action campaign. “Hunger globally is on the rise for the first time in decades. Malnutrition is robbing millions of their futures and holding back entire communities. We need a new financing model — one that invests in people, in nutrition, and in justice. We know what works. Now leaders must act.”
Well-nourished children grow into healthy adults who build strong economies and reduce dependence on foreign aid. According to the World Bank, every dollar invested in nutrition delivers $23 in returns. Yet financing remains woefully inadequate and fragmented. This week, leaders must lay the groundwork for reforming the system—maximizing existing funding and unlocking new financing from IFIs, climate and private sector, integrating nutrition across all policy areas, and creating conditions to leverage domestic resources to tackle hunger at its roots.
The projection marks the start of Global Citizen NOW: Sevilla, a high-level action summit convening global leaders and changemakers ahead of the FfD4 to catalyse immediate commitments on hunger, nutrition, while also highlighting the urgent need for investments in renewable energy across Africa, and transformative investments in development finance.
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For more information and to arrange interviews contact: media@globalcitizen.org
About Hungry for Action
The Hungry for Action campaign is calling for both urgent humanitarian action as well as long-term systems change to save lives now, build resilience and secure the future. The global campaign brings together civil society organisations and campaigners from across the climate, nutrition, debt, food security and food systems communities, and aims to raise the global food crisis to the top of the agenda and to secure vital financial reforms to break the cycle of crises.
https://www.hungryforaction.org/
Projections delivered by Paper Trails with the label: Lumen Trails
Lumen Trails lives for the moment the city blinks. When strangers stop. When phones come out. When a wall breathes light and turns into a shared experience. The projections for Hungry for Action work isn’t meant to be framed, it’s meant to take over public space and live on in people’s feeds. https://lumen-trails.com/
Paper Trails Europe (est. 2013, Amsterdam) is an independent out-of-home agency specialised in outdoor street advertising, authorised and guerilla.
29 June 2025
