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Hunger Eclipsed by Financial Crisis on World Food Day
ROME - The world's leading crusaders against hunger voiced frustration on Thursday, World Food Day, that the global financial crisis had overshadowed a food crisis tipping millions towards starvation.
Pakistani children eat their lunch on the eve of the World Food Day in a slum in Karachi, Pakistan, on Wednesday, Oct. 15, 2008. World food security, the challenges of climate change and bioenergy are the themes of this year's World Food Day on October 16, the day that FAO was founded in Quebec City in 1945, and now observed annually in some 150 countries. (AP Photo/Fareed Khan) The World Bank predicts that high food and fuel prices will increase
the number of malnourished people in the world by 44 million this year
to reach a total of 967 million.
Economists have also warned that the world's poor would be the most vulnerable to a global economic downturn.
"The media have highlighted the financial crisis at the expense of the food crisis," said Jacques Diouf, head of the U.N.'s Food and Agriculture Organisation in Rome. The World Food Programme's Executive Director Josette Sheeran acknowledged that even citizens of wealthy countries had been affected by high food prices and the financial crisis.
"But for those who live on less than a dollar a day, it's a matter of life and death," Sheeran said.
Proponents of more urgent measures questioned why the world's richest nations could not show the same urgency to save people from starvation as they did when rushing to rescue banks.
"My position is that the financial crisis is a serious one, and deserves urgent attention and focus, but so is the question of hunger, and millions (are) likely to die. Is that any less urgent?," asked former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan.
SPECULATION, SELFISHNESS
Pope Benedict said the blame for hunger could be directed at "boundless speculation" in markets, partly blamed for high food and fuel prices. But he also pointed to "selfishness" by the world's rich and a poor distribution of resources.
A Senegal-based NGO said the fading attention to the food crisis showed a "problem of justice, of equity and solidarity."
"If they are able to raise funds for the banking system, they can also find ways to reduce poverty in the world," Vore Gana Seck, President of Dakar-based CONGAD (Council of NGOs Supporting Development) told Reuters in the Senegalese capital.
"I think it's a problem of priority."
Prices of wheat, rice, maize and other staples in the developing world have all risen dramatically this year, although they have fallen from their peaks in recent months.
In Somalia, wheat prices have risen by 300 percent in the 15 months to April. Maize prices in southern Africa have risen by anywhere between 40 and 65 percent, crippling the ability of the poor to feed themselves, said aid group Oxfam.
"It is shocking that the international community has failed to organise itself to respond adequately" to the food and energy crisis, said Barbara Stocking, the head of Oxfam.
"We need to see one coordinated international response, led by the United Nations, which channels funds urgently to those in need, and leads on implementation of the longer-term reforms."
Diouf said the world has the know-how to end hunger, even if the population climbs to a forecast 9 billion people by 2050.
But he complained that his U.N. agency lacked resources and said that it only received 10 percent of the $22 billion (12.8 million pounds) pledged in June, following food riots in some of the affected countries.
"We have a serious shortfall in the financial resources needed to fulfill the expectations," Diouf said.
"In spite of the passionate speeches and financial commitments made by many countries, only a tiny proportion of what was promised in June has been delivered."
Additional reporting by Megan Rowling in Dublin, Pascal Fletcher in Dakar, Luke Baker in London
- Posted in
19 Comments so far
Show AllThe neocon strategy of inflating food and energy costs and suppressing family planning efforts expedites the neocon vision of increasing the world's population of desperately poor people willing to work for low or no wages.
Batman was good at fighting the forces of evil that threatened Gotham. Today's forces of evil (neocons) threaten the world.
Don't worry, soon enough food shortages will trump these economic crises. I've read a couple of articles recently that claimed that international food shipments are being held up because of the international credit problems.
But beyond that, we've been depleting global grain stocks for years and are at one of the lowest levels in decades. The U.S. has become a net importer of food - importing more than it exports. In other words, it doesn't produce enough food to feed its people, the difference made up by exporting our Treasury debt, the acceptance of which will probably not continue for much longer.
Finally, there is our just-in-time food distribution model, which is vulnerable to all manner of disruptions, from the financial problems of grocery store chains to rising fuel costs and shortages.
It might be a good idea to stock up at least three months worth of food, just in case...
Dave
http://daveeriqat.wordpress.com/
If they accepted Jesus as their saviour, they would be obese, and poor. If the rapture were to take place, what happens to the people who have never heard of him? I tried to read the left behind series and only managed to read about fifty pages before my mind started to turn to mush. Send GW to Pakistan to preach the new testiment. It's his duty, and it's their right!
Does Jesus play golf?
Last time I looked this morning the DOW was under 8500... and still dropping.
CNN and others are bemoaning the 'fact' that businesses small and large are having trouble getting credit to pay their bills and workers.
Think about that.
Because a good number of those businesses are the ones that grow and deliver your food.
And when the food stops being shipped to the stores, not because of fuel shortages, but because no one has been paid, you have three days.
In a modern city, that's all the food there is in storage and warehouses and homes.
Three days. Nine meals.
Three days until the food runs out, and people start doing anything to get their next meal.
Can I get a round of applause for President George W. Bush as he leaves?
Walk in peace.
I don't think we will go short of food in the US, but other countries surely will.
"Can I get a round of applause for President George W. Bush as he leaves?"
I think not, unless its in celebration.
I hate to inform you, but the US is a net IMPORTER of food.
And when the trucks don't roll, because they can't buy gas, or pay the drivers, the food does not arrive at your supermarket.
You also have to remember that the nations exporting the food will sell it to those who have ready cash to pay for the crops, and the food corporation sthat process much of the food will be in that same boat.
So the spectre of mass food shortages and famine are very, very real for the poor and middle class in America.
Don't say I didn't warn you.
I understand what you are saying, but I believe we will manage our problem much better than other nations.
Of course Texas is better situated to handle this than some states if you go on a state by state basis. Maybe that accounts for my immediate outlook.
I believe the financial disaster you are talking about will not happen. Its going to be tougher than anyone under the age of fifty has seen before, you're right and long, but we'll make it.
Some will make it.
Yes, some will...
Those who are prepared to do some damn hard work of growing their own food and learning how to make do in the ruins of what one was the world's pre-eminent superpower.
Walk in peace.
If they can get back the land.
You are correct. The food banks in my urban area are completely empty. The requet for help with food is up 600%. When we had that wind storm (global warming), peopeo wer without power for 16 days--up to 50,000 of them. Some places replaced what food stamp recipients had in their freezers, and some did not.
There is already a food shortage. The biofuel (with corn anyawy) is a bust.
My gawd, just think what we couldve done with that $850 billion , plus.just think. Or dont. It wil make you cry.
Sioux Rose
I remember the argument raised when the FCC deregulated media, that a portion of the bandwidth being GIVEN to the for-profit broadcast companies ought be reserved for public service, things like hearing what election candidates had to say. We know from statistics that generally the one who spends the most wins, and the spending is all about access to an audience, as in media exposure.
The same parallel applies now to the ridiculous giveaway to the banks. By making mandatory a small tax or fee on ALL stock transactions, even business loans, and a percentage of that percentage being RESERVED to fight world hunger, we'd see some progress. These hedge fund types who never performed HONEST WORK a day in their lives, many of them swimming in paper profit/wealth, must have hearts made of iron to not feel for the pain of so many others...
When I visited Nepal women spent all day gathering grain and placing HUGE stacks on their own backs to them ascend the mountain terrain to that that organic matter home. Men were often in town, drinking if they had access to it. The disparities in income and access to privilege are those that would even make Ebineezer Scrooge quake and shake in his pre-enlightened state.
"These hedge fund types who never performed HONEST WORK a day in their lives, many of them swimming in paper profit/wealth, must have hearts made of iron to not feel for the pain of so many others..."
Made of first grade granite would be my guess.
.I give you...Gordon Gekko ( movie reference...Greed)
This nation has been heading towards third world status for some time now. As the middle class continues to shrink and as the money migrates to fewer and fewer we more closely resemble them...I'll be in the bar, let me know when dinner is ready....
.
We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
Its not that bad, nor will we become a third world country. What we will do is restore our Republic and adjust some inequities I believe.
Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin said Thursday
that God blessed the United States with oil and gas
.
.
.
All I want is clear water to drink and fresh air to breathe but how can
I thank the Creator with a mouthful of crude oil and a breath of gas?
KDelphi:Do you live in Kentucky?Here in Wisconsin we've been on a long downward slide re hunger since "Toxic Tommy Thompson" had his 14 year reign as governor.He was rewarded yet again for his dismantling of welfare by being appointed by the Thorobred Association to monitor drug usage in the "Sport of Kings".Could there be anything more sardonically appropriate?
Wisconsin used to be one of the most progressive states but by all measures we are slipping.No state is immune but internal dislocation is likely as people try to find greener pastures.
Only a return to some progressivity in the tax code and most importantly drastic cuts in the MIC will prevent circumstances as dire as the Great Depression.
Why are you asking if I live in Ky?? (I did once--when I quit hs and got married--didnt last) I live in an urban neighborhood.
I am sorry to hear about Wisconsin--I used to have family there.
I agree on the progressive tax code--but USAns are a bunch of "tax paranoids"--they dont mind paying 10 times more for what is a necsessity, as long as they get to "choose". (Or can be convinced tah they have "chosen")
It's either gonna be peak oil and the rising financial costs that will guarentee the second Great Depression. My scary guess is that both will happen and this country will witness the GREATER DEPRESSION the likes of which we're all gonna be forced to live like the Africans. In fact, it has already been getting tougher here in South Carolina.
P.S.: With the way oil prices are being manipulated, I don't see pushing forth of solar and wind technologies or the legalization of hemp making it in this self-righteous society. :(