Mary Dinah Foundation Brings Frontline Experience on Child Survival, Nutrition, Development At 81st UNGA, New York

Kasim Sumaina in Abuja

The Mary Dinah Foundation (MDF) is participating in the 81st session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York, with Founder and CEO Lady Mary Dinah contributing to high-level panels and convenings, bringing frontline experience from MDF’s work across Africa to global discussions on child survival, nutrition, and humanitarian action.

Throughout UNGA High-Level Week, Lady Mary Dinah has joined global leaders, development partners and philanthropists to discuss some of the most pressing challenges facing vulnerable communities and the solutions needed to address them at scale.

Among her engagements, Lady Mary Dinah is speaking at the high-level side event “Our Children Cannot Wait: Leadership, Solidarity and Action for Child Survival and Nutrition,” hosted by His Majesty King Letsie III of the Kingdom of Lesotho, in partnership with Nutrition International and the Government of Canada. The event brings together global leaders and partners around the urgent need to accelerate action for child survival and nutrition.

Lady Mary Dinah is also participating in a Concordia roundtable on “Rethinking Global Health Finance: Mobilizing Private Capital for Health Outcomes,” bringing perspectives from Africa and MDF’s experience working with vulnerable communities to discussions on how global systems can better support locally driven and sustainable solutions.

With more than 125 million meals delivered to vulnerable and crisis-affected communities across West and Central Africa, MDF works alongside governments, UN agencies, development partners and local communities to address hunger and malnutrition, improve access to essential healthcare and protection services, and strengthen the resilience of children, women and families affected by conflict and displacement.MDF’s participation comes at a time when global conversations are increasingly focused on how to sustain progress on nutrition, health and humanitarian action while mobilising new partnerships and financing. Through its work across Africa, the Foundation connects immediate humanitarian assistance with longer-term investments in health, nutrition, protection and community resilience.“Africa’s challenges cannot be addressed through short-term interventions alone,” said Lady Mary Dinah.

“We need to move from responding to crisis to building systems that enable communities to withstand crisis in the first place. That means investing in nutrition, health, women and children, while bringing governments, philanthropy, business and communities together around solutions that can work at scale.”

Lady Mary Dinah’s participation at UNGA81 reflects MDF’s commitment to bringing the voices and realities of communities affected by hunger, malnutrition and displacement into global decision-making, while building the partnerships needed to turn commitments into meaningful action.