The reason for my travel to this remote location of just a few hundred people is simple: As the UN World Food Programme (WFP) Niger Country Director, I am on my way to Touqfine to find out exactly what the villagers are eating this hunger season to survive.

Currently, more than 18 million people in the Sahel region of West Africa are facing a food crisis. Food supplies are nearly nonexistent. Prices for food are rising drastically. Women and children are faced with the harsh reality of hunger.

In the last few weeks, as a regional communications manager for the humanitarian organization CARE, I have talked to families in several regions of Niger. Despite the variety of personal circumstances, certain elements appear often in people's stories.

The moment that brought us all to laughs, clapping, and even near to tears came from one little wail from a tiny two-year-old. Moments before, he was all but motionless in his mother's arms, only reacting with shrieks as the nurse at the child nutrition clinic tried to weigh him.

Among so many world leaders and high-level representatives from civil society and academia, I felt a sense of critical mass beginning to form in the fight to end global hunger.