Story highlights President Trump's budget proposal greatly reduces the amount of international food aid given by the United States to other countries

Sen. Jerry Moran: This is a mistake because this aid serves American security interests by promoting a more peaceful and stable world

Jerry Moran is a United States Senator for Kansas and a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee. He serves as co-chair of the Senate Hunger Caucus and formerly chaired the Senate Agriculture Appropriations Subcommittee, which allocates funding for certain USAID and USDA global food programs. The views expressed in this commentary are his own.

(CNN) Regardless of faith, ethnicity or class, each of us is taught at a young age that it is our duty to help those in need. Americans take that moral responsibility to heart. As individuals, we help our neighbors. Through churches and local organizations, we feed our communities. And as a country, America leads the world in providing food for millions of people in need of assistance.

When governments cannot feed their own people, chaos and violence are sure to follow. Food assistance provided by the United States -- almost 10% of hard red winter wheat exports in 2016 were through food aid programs -- leads to greater stability in regions of the world important to America's strategic interests. The President's proposed budget cuts to food aid programs would only undermine those interests.

Senator Jerry Moran

While our country's collective moral convictions make fighting hunger the right thing to do, the benefits we receive as a nation from reducing global food insecurity also make it the smart thing to do.

President Ronald Reagan recognized the power of food in shaping foreign policy. In 1983, at a signing of a World Food Day proclamation, Reagan chided the Soviet Union for failing to provide humanitarian relief to those in need, and offered a direct challenge to the Kremlin to explain why the Soviet Union only provided weapons but not food assistance to the underdeveloped world.

While the threats of today are different than those faced during the Cold War, American food aid continues to serve our national interests by promoting political, economic and social stability on a global scale, in addition to elevating our country's moral standing and leadership.

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