We are just over a week on from World Food Day. Statistics published to coincide with the event indicate that 923 million people worldwide are short of food and undernourished. If that number is too big to cope with, or seems meaningless, then think of it as every person in America - North and South - being without food. Or every single country in the European Union, plus a few more for good measure, without the wherewithal to feed that population.
As you know, I have been mithering about food shortages from Iceland to Egypt, Peru to Haiti, for most of this year and over the last week I have monitored what's happening even more closely than normal. For over two million people in North Korea, October looks like it will be the worst month yet as current reports from Associated Press indicate starvation is now a reality in parts of the country, even though the regime is apparently taking draconian steps to prevent the spread of this news to the world at large.
Couple that with the ghastly situation in Zimbabwe, add in Antigua's problems along with the many other countries facing food shortages highlighted in this week's news - a brief list is below if you are interested in seeing for yourself. Even little old Wales is starting to discuss the problem of food security. Earlier this year in Egypt, there were, if you missed it, deadly food riots as people struggled to feed themselves. Haiti saw similar scenes as did Peru.
This is not a problem that is going away anytime soon and is likely to get a great deal worse. The United Nations predicts that 100 million people worldwide are going to go hungry this year - which means no food at all - because of the hike in food prices. Not just because as individual families or communities they cannot afford the food, but because the aid agencies, which have been the backstop in times of food crisis, are hit by the same problem - it becomes harder for them to buy the extra food necessary to give away.
I don't know if you have ever played that game where you set up dominoes on their ends, then knock the last one over to create a chain reaction that brings your domino pattern to the floor? Well, the global dominoes set up over the last decade are starting to tumble. The collapse of the financial markets, over-experimentation and production of biofuels, an over reliance on - and now shortage of - fossil-fuel based fertilizers, isolationist and destructive political environments, conflict and war, lack of care for the environment and each other are all starting to tumble, unstoppable, to the floor.
Most of us do not have a direct link to the food chain. I am one of millions that rely on supermarkets, markets and local suppliers for food for my family, despite an amateurish attempt at beans and tomatoes in the garden. Even here, in an affluent Western economy, the rice and flour shelves are looking unusually bare. I'm not sure what the next stage will be or when it is likely to change, but if current reports and trends are any indicator of what's to come, it will be a cold, hard winter in the Northern Hemisphere and a chill, sobering summer here in the South.
Peru
More on North Korea
Cambodia
Ethiopia
Antigua
Stories from Phillipines, Guatemala and Zambia
Global Hunger Index - 33 Countries have 'alarming' or 'extremely alarming' levels of hunger
Round up from South Asia
International Medical Corps - extract below:
The U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization, which founded World Food
Day, estimates the number of people around the globe who are
undernourished at 923 million. The World Food Program estimates 15.7
million of those in need of assistance are in the Horn of Africa; 8.6
million in Afghanistan and 3.7 million in North Korean. UNICEF reports
that 143 million children under the age of five in the developing world
are underweight. Worldwide, the price of staples, such as wheat, flour
and cooking oil have tripled and even quadrupled.
Eastern Europe
Problems with Food Aid
Kenya
What people are prepared to do to help
Ethiopian Relief Problems
And finally - Iceland gets a loan...
What could you do?
Draw attention to the situation - share the links so people at least take note that this is something that is likely to affect them too
Write to your Government - ask for action, question what they might be doing.
Support the aid agencies
Grow some food
Food shortages: Price of food basics triples - 923 million people undernourished worldwide
We are just over a week on from World Food Day. Statistics published to coincide with the event indicate that 923 million people worldwide are short of food and undernourished. If that number is too big to cope with, or seems meaningless, then think of it as every person in America - North and South - being without food. Or every single country in the European Union, plus a few more for good measure, without the wherewithal to feed that population.
As you know, I have been mithering about food shortages from Iceland to Egypt, Peru to Haiti, for most of this year and over the last week I have monitored what's happening even more closely than normal. For over two million people in North Korea, October looks like it will be the worst month yet as current reports from Associated Press indicate starvation is now a reality in parts of the country, even though the regime is apparently taking draconian steps to prevent the spread of this news to the world at large.
Couple that with the ghastly situation in Zimbabwe, add in Antigua's problems along with the many other countries facing food shortages highlighted in this week's news - a brief list is below if you are interested in seeing for yourself. Even little old Wales is starting to discuss the problem of food security. Earlier this year in Egypt, there were, if you missed it, deadly food riots as people struggled to feed themselves. Haiti saw similar scenes as did Peru.
This is not a problem that is going away anytime soon and is likely to get a great deal worse. The United Nations predicts that 100 million people worldwide are going to go hungry this year - which means no food at all - because of the hike in food prices. Not just because as individual families or communities they cannot afford the food, but because the aid agencies, which have been the backstop in times of food crisis, are hit by the same problem - it becomes harder for them to buy the extra food necessary to give away.
I don't know if you have ever played that game where you set up dominoes on their ends, then knock the last one over to create a chain reaction that brings your domino pattern to the floor? Well, the global dominoes set up over the last decade are starting to tumble. The collapse of the financial markets, over-experimentation and production of biofuels, an over reliance on - and now shortage of - fossil-fuel based fertilizers, isolationist and destructive political environments, conflict and war, lack of care for the environment and each other are all starting to tumble, unstoppable, to the floor.
Most of us do not have a direct link to the food chain. I am one of millions that rely on supermarkets, markets and local suppliers for food for my family, despite an amateurish attempt at beans and tomatoes in the garden. Even here, in an affluent Western economy, the rice and flour shelves are looking unusually bare. I'm not sure what the next stage will be or when it is likely to change, but if current reports and trends are any indicator of what's to come, it will be a cold, hard winter in the Northern Hemisphere and a chill, sobering summer here in the South.
Peru
More on North Korea
Cambodia
Ethiopia
Antigua
Stories from Phillipines, Guatemala and Zambia
Global Hunger Index - 33 Countries have 'alarming' or 'extremely alarming' levels of hunger
Round up from South Asia
International Medical Corps - extract below:
The U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization, which founded World Food Day, estimates the number of people around the globe who are undernourished at 923 million. The World Food Program estimates 15.7 million of those in need of assistance are in the Horn of Africa; 8.6 million in Afghanistan and 3.7 million in North Korean. UNICEF reports that 143 million children under the age of five in the developing world are underweight. Worldwide, the price of staples, such as wheat, flour and cooking oil have tripled and even quadrupled.
Eastern Europe
Problems with Food Aid
Kenya
What people are prepared to do to help
Ethiopian Relief Problems
And finally - Iceland gets a loan...
What could you do?
Draw attention to the situation - share the links so people at least take note that this is something that is likely to affect them too
Write to your Government - ask for action, question what they might be doing.
Support the aid agencies
Grow some food
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