FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: January 13, 2025

Contact: Johanna Elsemore at jelsemore@strength.org

GEORGIA: A new statewide poll from No Kid Hungry shows many low-income Georgia families struggle to afford enough food during the summer. Of those eligible for Summer EBT, also known as SUN Bucks, nearly 79% often find themselves without enough money for food and nearly three quarters (73%) struggle to provide their kids with enough nutritious food when school is out in the summer.

Last Summer, Georgia was one of only 13 states not to offer Summer EBT, a new federal grocery benefits program that helps families afford the added cost of food when kids are home for summer break. If implemented, it’s estimated the program would help prevent nearly 1.2 million school aged kids from facing summer hunger and funnel more than $138 million federal dollars into the state.

Summer has long been the hungriest time of year for many kids, as they no longer receive meals at school. Traditional summer meal programs have long helped nourish kids in the summertime, but they only reach a fraction of the kids who need them due to challenges like transportation and parents’ work schedules. Summer EBT helps fill that gap by providing eligible families with $120 per child to buy food in the summer months.

Poll data shows Georgia families eligible for Summer EBT would use the benefits to buy nutritious food. When asked how they would spend $120 in grocery benefits, half (51%) said they would use the extra room in their grocery budget to buy fresh fruits and vegetables, and 39% would buy meat and other forms of protein.

“We’d be getting fast food a whole lot less frequently and would instead be buying a surplus of fresh fruits, vegetables, pastas, meats, etc.” said one Gwinnett County mom. “I would use the extra benefits to buy healthy snack options,” another Chatham County mom told us.

Despite the high need in the state, Georgia has not yet indicated plans to offer Summer EBT in 2025.

“The need in Georgia is high, with 1 in 5 kids living in food insecure households. For many of those kids, summer is the hungriest season,” said Kate Goodin with No Kid Hungry. “Summer EBT offers an unprecedented opportunity to end summer hunger by reaching kids we’ve never been able to reach before with traditional summer meal programs.”

Nearly all Georgians (94%) agree that child hunger should not exist in the state and that ending childhood hunger in Georgia should be a bipartisan goal (92%). Georgians want to see more action from elected officials to end childhood hunger, with four in five (79%) saying Summer EBT and similar programs are core to achieving this goal.

“It’s not just policy, it’s good politics too,” Goodin adds. “Georgians want to see our elected leaders prioritizing child hunger.”

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About No Kid Hungry No child should go hungry in America. But millions of kids will face hunger this year. No Kid Hungry is ending childhood hunger through effective programs that provide kids with the food they need. This is a problem we know how to solve. No Kid Hungry is a campaign of Share Our Strength, an organization working to end hunger and poverty. Join us at NoKidHungry.org.