dan glickman stepped forward and announced the formation of the civil rights task force. that press conference in december of 1996, madam speaker, was essentially the confession by the department of agriculture that they had engaged in racial discrimination with farm programs, crop payments, disaster payments and loans. and this started then the litigation that was at least anticipated at the time and this litigation began in 1997. so in february of -- february 28 of 1997 the civil rights task force of the usda recommended 92 changes and those changes were not implemented and so in 1997, the same year, the litigation against the u.s. department of agriculture for discrimation against african-american farmers began in august of 1997, two cases. one was brought by timothy pigford. the other one was brewington vs. glickman. it dealt with the farmers from 1983 until 1997 when they applied for federal financial help. by failing to investigate discrimination. the allegations of discrimination were not aggressively investigated and those who applied for financial help often didn

of walter media, our -- washington correspondent arshad mahmoud, dan glickman, former u.s.re secretary and now a senior fellow at the bipartisan policy center who's a guest of our speaker, myron bellkind, the national press club secretary and professor of journalism at the george washington university, myron is chairman. press club's international correspondents committee. richard leach, the world food program u.s.a. president and c.e.o. and a guest of our speaker, and andrew schneider, chairman of the national press club speakers committee and the associated editor -- associated tore at kiplinger and allison fitzgerald, a reporter with bloomberg news who worked on bloomberg's recipe for famine. and lisa gillespie, managing editor of street sense and also the new media director there, andrea schneider, bloomberg news editor, geraldine ryerson cruise, the international news manager for world vision, and ed mixner editor of kiplinger agricultural letter. [applause] earlier this month, crusaders against global hunger like our speaker today received relatively good news from th

dan glickman, a senior fellow, a guest of our speaker. he national press club's secretary and professor of law and journalism at the george washington university. he is the chairman of the press club correspondence committee. richard leech, a guest of our speaker. andrew snyder, chairman of the speaker's committee and associate editor at kid er.pling lisa ling gillespie, managing editor of street sense. and your snyder -- andrea snyder. kiplinger.of the [applause] earlier this month, crusaders against global hunger received relatively good news from the united nations. the number of people experiencing hunger worldwide fell from 1 billion to a mere nine of the 25 million. that is the right direction. -- to a mere 925 million. front rebuilding haiti -- from rebuilding haiti, the world's largest distributor of food to the port is involved with beating the lives of the so- called bottom billion. the organization's goal is to reach more than 90 million people with food assistance in more than 70 countries. 10,000 people work for the organizat