Food Shortages [Ebony's Pearls]

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Itzl before the Keyboard
Originally uploaded by nodigio

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/americas/03/24/food.ap/index.html

This is even more reason why we must grow some of our own food, and why we should encourage public gardens and the sowing of urban crops wherever we can. A food shortage can be reversed in 4 months if we make the effort needed to end it. Maybe we won’t be getting wheat or rice in 4 months, but we can get greens and carrots and potatoes.

“The U.N.'s World Food Program says it's facing a $500 million shortfall in funding this year to feed 89 million needy people.”

I don’t understand this – I donate more now than I have in the past, and I know others who have increased their donations. Are we the abberration or the norm, and if we’re the norm, where is all that money going?

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There are 11 comments on this entry. (Reply.)

I don't know if you're the norm or not, but I'd bet that you're not the norm.

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I may not be the norm in my income level, but I'd like to think I was the norm for those wealthier than me because if I can afford to be charitable, they can afford to be charitable.

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I had read a few days ago that a big part of that shortfall is due to currency exchange rates, which just strikes me as odd. Do they really only get funding from the US?

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Yeah, there was a lot about this that bothered me. I haven't had much time to think it all through.

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A big part of the shortfall is the sudden rise in the 'middle classes' of china and India, who are now demanding the same unhealthy foods that they've seen us eat.

Plus, there have been harvest failures in Argentina and Australia, adding to the problem, and corn being grown for fuel, not food.

Lots of little things piling up to make something big.

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I know. The article points those out. What gets me is the World Food Program claiming the funding shortage.

Plus, there are lots of little things we can do to decrease or at least ease the food shortage in the short term, if we'd just do them: eliminating HFCS in our diet (who'd miss it, really?), encouraging the growing of food in non-traditional places and ways, and using our vaunted technology to help these underdeveloped nations grow their own food. It only takes one growing season to start seeing results.

So why aren't we doing it?

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I am doing my own small part- I've discovered that my body is happier without so much grain in my diet, so I've practically eliminated that from my diet, and I am putting in a nice combination container and raised bed garden this year.

And like you, I've declared HFCS and other not-really-food additives non-players in my diet.

As for our 'vaunted technology', it does more harm to developing countries than good. Monsanto is particularly insidious with their 'terminator' seeds and other devious ways to part people from their money by making them buy seeds every year rather than saving them and reseeding on their own. I would like to see us use our intellectual and analytical firepower to help people in such places do what they already do better.

I've reversed the whole local/global paradigm- while I think globally, I prefer to act locally. I feel that we need to pull back from national and global concerns and concentrate on our own areas, and the interfaces with our neighboring areas. Smaller coverage makes for finer interaction.

One of my friends is taking a master gardener class, and is sharing what she is learning with me. The state Cooperative Extension people encourage this, and we hope that something wonderful (besides my garden) will result. I get to be the guinea pig!

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Oh dear! I wasn't talking about the terminator seed technology, which is evil and must be stomped out. I was thinking more about our hydroponics technology which allows small crops to grow in drought areas with less water, effort, and disease (which sounds kind of backward - it's growing plants in water instead of soil, but it really does use less water), and some of our conservation farming techniques, and encouraging people to grow diverse food crops rather than huge monocrops, and better irrigations methods in areas that aren't really drought-stricken, but don't have easily accessed water.

I agree that we must act locally even as we interact and think globally. And we need to instill this attitude around the world - other people need to act in their local areas to help themselves and their neighbors instead of looking for handouts from other nations or fighting one another over resources and control of resources.

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this is also one those areas where we're shooting ourselves in the foot, in the sense of efficiency. the American FDA sets out food standards that don't make much in the way of sense for crops and the like - it's usually based on size, color, things that don't indicate health, really. the result is, if you've got a late freeze, you can't get the produce you grow approved by the FDA. so it sits - and rots - in the fields, because you can't sell it at market. to add insult to injury, you can't even donate it to starving countries, because donated food... has to meet those same FDA standards that put you in this position in the first place.

this is one of those areas where the laws are a good chunk of the problem for relatively *insane* reasons, and completely need to be overhauled for better working. globally, between America and Russia, there's literally no reason why we shouldn't be able to feed everyone on the planet, easily, every year, unless we have another 1930s drought + depression again. and the depression bit may hit, but we're not in the same serious drought conditions as back then.

-bs

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not sure that was coherent - 'if you've got a late freeze, or other condition that leads to small or miscolored, but otherwise health produce....'

-bs

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I agree. And it shouldn't be such a chore to fix this, even though it is.

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Ebony's Pearls

Food Shortages

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August