Michael Schut is the Seattle-based author of Food & Faith: Justice, Joy and Daily Bread. He leads retreats on the topics of spirituality, sustainability and eco-justice.

Created by the state Legislature in 1989, the Oregon Hunger Relief Task Force promotes awareness, compiles research and works on public policy change. One in six Oregonians – a record number – received SNAP (food stamp) benefits in June 2009. Oregon Faith Roundtable Against Hunger is a partner organization. Contact Simone Crowe, communications director.

Food Lifeline in Seattle is Washington state’s largest hunger relief agency. It has statistics on the people it serves. Mark Coleman is communications director.

Tamera Zivic is executive director of the World Hunger Education, Advocacy & Training (WHEAT) Organization in Phoenix, which works with 5,300 congregations in Arizona. She is a member of the national board of Bread for the World.

Donald E. Messer is a co-author of Ending Hunger Now. A United Methodist theologian, he is now executive director of the Center for Church and Global AIDS, which is based in Centennial, Colo.

The Houston Food Bank is dedicated to feeding those without sufficient food in the Houston area. The media relations contact is Adele Brady.

The Rime Buddhist Center in Kansas City, Mo., teaches Buddhist tradition and Tibetan culture and to increase cultural understanding between the East and the Western world. Gabi Otto is the executive director. Email through the website.

Jack R. Kloppenburg Jr. is a professor in the department of community and environmental sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He teaches a course called Food, Culture and Society, which explores hunger issues.

James P. Ziliak is director of the Center for Poverty Research at the University of Kentucky, where he also holds the Gatton Endowed Chair in Microeconomics. He was the lead researcher on a 2008 national study of hunger among the nation’s senior citizens.