How The Global Food System Creates Hunger
Posted on July 18, 2011 in Videos
Food crises facts:
* Approximately 1 billion people around the world go to bed hungry each night.
* Somewhere in the world someone starves to death every 3.6 seconds, and 75 percent of those are children under the age of five.
* 1.1 billion people were living on less than $1 a day and 923 million were undernourished, even before the food, fuel and financial crises.
* According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, U.S. corn reserves will drop to a 15 year low by the end of 2011.
* The United Nations says that the global price of food hit another new all-time high in the month of January.
* The price of corn has doubled in the past six months.
* The price of wheat has roughly doubled since the middle of 2010.
very bad. A effective food system is needed in order to help hungry people.
So in other words we should sacrifice our standard of living to assist the third world. Actually…..no, we should strive to advance our standard of living to include our diet. This will spur new development, production and technology which in turn will gradually rise the standard of living in these “southern” countries. Although the diets are insufficient and bland by our standards, the global food market is what has enabled these countries to achieve such height population levels. Before the introduction of grains and rice such populations would never have reached the levels to advance beyond the agrarian level of society. Moving to a more industrialized society will inturn allow them to better utilize existing natural resources which in turn will create more wealth (ie. standard of living) thus affording them a better diet.
Rod, I do not see where we need to sacrifice our standard of living, we just need to live differently, and ultimately better. The amount of input it takes to make our current world food system work could be re-created to use less and create more, put more people to work, improve the environment, and give people a better standard of living across the board. Plus, if done correctly, we could improve our global infrastructure to allow for rare and different (to westerners) foods to be imported to the U.S. I could write for hours on how it could work, but until the majority of people decide it is time for a positive change and start acting on it, nothing will change.
Surely the answer to the global food crisis has been evident for more than two decades now? The green revolution in Asia and India served to keep food productions level with the ( overestimated ) growth in the population back then…. technology will do the same today – and for tomorrow. Look at what Brazil has done in terms of land reclamation and cattle production in the last 5 years. Political will is the determining factor in food production–