Desertification, The Green Revolution and The Blue Revolution

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Feeding the World and Addressing Poverty
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Society comprises two classes  those who have
more food than appetite, and those who have more
appetite than food.  Sébastien-Roch Nicholas
de Chamfort, Maximes
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It is a poverty to decide that a child must die
so that you may live as you wish Mother Teresa
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Remember the poor it costs nothing Mark Twain
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It is a tragic mix-up when the United States
spends 500,000 for every enemy soldier killed,
and only 53 annually on the victims of
poverty Martin Luther King Jr.
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http//www.nypost.com/p/news/local/queens/passers_
by_let_good_sam_die_5SGkf5XDP5ooudVuEd8fbI
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Real poverty is lack of books Sinonie Gabrielle
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Women do two thirds of the world's work. Yet they
earn only one tenth of the world's income and own
less than one percent of the world's property.
They are among the poorest of the world's
poor Barber B. Conable
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Poverty is like punishment for a crime you didn't
commit.  Eli Khamarov, Lives of the Cognoscenti
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The prevalent fear of poverty among the educated
classes is the worst moral disease from which our
civilization suffers.  William James
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Poverty is the worst form of violence. Mahatma
Gandhi
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The most terrible poverty is loneliness, and the
feeling of being unloved Mother Teresa
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The poverty of our century is unlike that of any
other.  It is not, as poverty was before, the
result of natural scarcity, but of a set of
priorities imposed upon the rest of the world by
the rich.  Consequently, the modern poor are not
pitied...but written off as trash.  The
twentieth-century consumer economy has produced
the first culture for which a beggar is a
reminder of nothing.  John Berger Isle of
Flowers ??? English Dub Directed by Jorge
Furtado - YouTube
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What is Poverty?

• Poverty is deprivation of those things that
  determine the quality of life, including food,
  clothing, shelter and safe drinking water, but
  also such "intangibles" as the opportunity to
  learn and to enjoy the respect of fellow
  citizens.
• The Universal Declaration of Human Rights

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Maslows Hierarchy of Needs
Basic needs
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Poverty

• Poverty may affect individuals or groups, and is
  not confined to the developing nations. The 2011
  Occupy Wall Street/Halifax/etc. showed the
  growing gap between the rich and the poor. The
  2008 Recession has hurt the Western world. Greece
  and others have become much poorer and had to cut
  back government programs. Who is affected the
  most? THE POOR.
• Poverty in developed countries is manifest in a
  set of social problems including homelessness and
  the persistence of "ghetto" housing clusters.
• Elvis Presley - In the Ghetto Lyrics - YouTube
• Grandmaster Flash The Message HQ YouTube
• Rocinha - the biggest favela in Brazil YouTube
• Police attempt to fight fear in Rio Favelas -
  YouTube
• Trenchtown YouTube
• MARLEY - Trenchtown Rock (live) YouTube
• bob marley no woman no cry with lyrics - YouTube

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THE POVERTY CYCLE AND INADEQUATE FOOD
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Causes of poverty

1. Overpopulation/lack of access to birth control
   methods (India, Haiti)
2. Crime (a cause and an effect)
3. War (a cause and effect)
4. Discrimination/Racism
5. European Colonialism era treated people like
   servants in their own land (First Nations,
   Africa, Asia)
6. Poor, corrupt government in the post-Colonialism
   era keeping poor people down or civil wars that
   resulted (Rwanda)
7. Lack of natural resources and proper nutrition
8. Chaotic Climate
9. Natural Disasters
10. Landlocked (no trade-Congo)http//www.nationsonlin
    e.org/oneworld/developing_countries.htm
11. Isolated geography (Nepal, Mongolia)

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RESULTS?

• FAMINES IN ETHIOPIA, SOMALIA, IRELAND, CHINA,
  BANGLADESH. ETC.
• Inability to bounce back from Natural Disasters
  (such as Haiti and earthquakes, hurricanes,
  floods, deforestation and soil degradation)
• Increased debt to rich countries
• Civil wars caused by poverty
• Poor health
• POVERTY CYCLE DEEPENS OVER MANY GENERATIONS

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Desertification.What is It?

• Land degradation in arid, semi arid and dry
  sub-humid areas due to
• Over cultivation
• Overgrazing
• Deforestation
• Poor irrigation practices

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Problems with Desertification

• Drought - Irregular precipitation
• Populations in these areas used the methods of
  shifting agriculture and nomadic herding to
  respond to these challenges but
• changing economic and political circumstances,
  population growth, and a trend towards more
  settled communities has increased desertification
  

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Scrub becoming desert
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• The Earth's drylands are found in more than 110
  nations, and moderate to severe land degradation
  has reduced the productivity of more than 70 of
  these areas..

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Levels of degradation in the world
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Consequences

• reduces the lands resilience to natural climate
  variability.
• Soil becomes less productive
• Vegetation becomes damaged or lost
• Some of the consequences are borne by people
  living outside the immediately affected area
• Food production is undermined
• Desertification contributes to famine
• Desertification is a huge drain on economic
  resources

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Africa and Desertification

• 2/3 of the continent is desert or drylands.
• affected by frequent and severe droughts.
• Many African nations are landlocked, have
  widespread poverty, need external assistance and
  depend heavily on natural resources for
  subsistence
• few institutional, legal, scientific, technical
  and educational resources
• linked to migration and food security-Sahel zone
  (southern border of the Sahara Desert )

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What about North America?

• 90 of arid land impacted
• overstocking (livestock)- contributes to erosion
  and desertification.
• excessive withdrawals of groundwater - resulting
  in a rapid decline in height of the water table.
• salinization from salts left behind on the soil
  surface after the irrigation water has evaporated.

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How can all of the people in the world be fed?
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Food Distribution Problems

• Thanks to the Green and Blue Revolutions, we now
  have proven Malthus wrong. We have enough food
  for the population.
• But, we still have hunger.
• Why?

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War

• Famine often accompanies war
• Not able to plant crops too dangerous
• Foreign Aid Food Relief resources only available
  during ceasefires
• Sometimes the resources are taken by the
  government or military powers to feed the
  soldiers rather than the civilians (like Somalia
  in the early 1990s)

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Debt

• Many countries owe the IMF or World Bank for
  development loans that they received and
  therefore sanctions are imposed on their
  countries-no imports
• Forced to grow cash crops for profit coffee,
  cotton, tea, sugar cane, peanuts. This leaves
  less land for subsistence food crops
• This all leads means cutting spending on health,
  education, and housing leading to greater poverty
  and the cycle continues.

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Technology

• Green Revolution increased food supply in poorer
  nations
• Super seeds require more water, fertilizer and
  pesticides.
• Poor countries cant afford to grow food in this
  kind of system.
• Contaminates water

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Natural Causes

• Drought makes farming impossible
• Poor soil quality due to overuse/degradation/deser
  tification
• Flooding ruins land

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The Green Revolution

• The introduction and rapid spread of high yield
  wheat and rice. First large use of chemical
  pesticides (some of which are now banned due to
  being cancer causing like DDT) and high yield
  varieties of crops
• Achieved by crossing of the different strains of
  major food crops to greater and larger yields
  that were more resistance to drought and disease.
  
• mid 1960s Rockefellar Foundation work in Mexico
• Purpose To meet the food needs of the
  developing world.
• PBS NewsHour PBS

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The Results.

• led to greater grain and rice production
• higher food outputs for LDCs
• Helped stave off catastrophic famines! Malthus
  thought food supply could not keep up with
  population boom. This has lessened the impact.
• Economic and food self-sufficiency resulted for
  some countries (Pakistan-wheat exporter,
  India-from 11 m tonnes to 27 m tons from 1965 to
  1972, Mexico- double wheat yields, Philippines
  and Indonesia-rice previously imported)
• Planting dates become more flexible and
  agriculture easier to manage.

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Criticisms of the Green Revolution

• Rich farmers have the resources for fertilizer,
  pesticides, irrigation water, machinery, storage
  and transportation (gap between rich and poor
  farmers widen)
• Colour, texture and tastes of new rice not well
  received.
• More difficult to raise output of rice with
  biotechnology due to precise water control.
• high yield varieties more costly to produce
• Many HYVs require more labour than the
  traditional counterparts (irrigation and
  fertilization)
• Contamination of watersheds by nitrates and
  phosphates, long term destroyed soil
• Loss of biodiversity-4 strains of wheat produce
  3/4 of Canadas crop.
• If farmers only rely on a few strains of a plant,
  a new disease can wipe out a large portion of the
  harvest

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Solutions to food supply

• Maintain genetic banks where seeds from a great
  diversity of plants can be frozen and stored to
  be used later.
• Control population as China has with restrictive
  one child policy (Ted Turner of CNN has called
  for a Global One Child Policy)
• Genetically modified foods (GM) that wont rot.
  Not popular
• Get more protein from the sea BUT AVOID
  OVERFISHING
• The Blue Revolution/AQUACULTURE

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The Blue Revolution

• Modern technology has allowed us to obtain food
  from the sea in many fish varieties
• increased seventeen fold in the last fifty years
• Aquaculture, or the growing or harvesting of
  marine plants and animals for human consumption,
  is predicted to overtake the traditional wild
  fishery

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What it can do

• Protein source for the one billion chronically
  malnourished people worldwide.
• Relieve pressure on land so that soil degradation
  does not occur.

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Concerns

• Exploitation of the traditional wild fishery
  (ATLANTIC COD)
• Aquaculture destroys land along coasts
• Water pollution
• Wetland loss
• Spread of disease
• In Nova Scotia, the government is allowing more
  aquaculture. Environmentalists, tourism operators
  and fisheries people seem to be ok with when they
  are kept in tanks located on land but oppose the
  use of pens in coastal areas. Why? This is
  because
• Natural fisheries could be negatively impacted by
  any diseases or pollution that might come from
  the raised species.
• Already there have been outbreaks of sea lice and
  sea anemia disease in some caged salmon.
• Toxic waste from salmon feedlots can pollute
  formerly pristine bays.
• Lobster and lobster larvae have been harmed and
  displaced.
• Escaped salmon from feedlots weaken the strain of
  wild salmon when they breed with them
• Cooke Aquaculture Videos Voices for our
  Coast Aquaculture Rally - YouTube

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A Popular Term We Need To Know
GMOs - Genetically modified organisms

• GMO - an organism that expresses traits that
  result
• from the introduction of foreign DNA
• Originally a term equivalent to transgenic
  organism
• Also called GMFs or Frankenfoods

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What About the Terms Genetic Engineering/Genetical
ly Modified?
Genetic engineering is the basic tool set of
biotechnology
Genetic engineering involves

• Isolating genes
• Modifying genes so they function better
• Preparing genes to be inserted into a new
  species
• Developing transgenes

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What is a transgenic?
Concept Based on the Term Transgene
Transgene the genetically engineered gene added
to a species
Ex. modified EPSP synthase gene (encodes a
protein that functions even when plant is treated
with Roundup)
Transgenic an organism containing a transgene
introduced by technological (not breeding)
methods
Ex. Roundup Ready Crops (owned by Monsanto, as
seen in Food Inc)
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Why are transgenics important?
We can develop organisms that express a novel
trait not normally found in the species
Extended shelf-life tomato (Flavr-Savr)
Herbicide resistant soybean (Roundup Ready)
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Agriculture Transgenics On the Market

• Insect resistant cotton Bt toxin kills the
• cotton boll worm
• transgene Bt protein

Source USDA

• Insect resistant corn Bt toxin kills the
• European corn borer
• transgene Bt protein

Normal
Transgenic
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Herbicide resistant crops Now soybean, corn,
canola Coming sugarbeet, lettuce, strawberry
alfalfa, potato, wheat
Source Monsanto
Virus resistance - papya resistant to papaya
ringspot virus
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Biotech chymosin the enzyme used to curdle milk
products
Source Chr. Hansen
bST bovin somatotropin used to increase milk
production (remember Food IncWAl-MART STOPPED
Bst Milk)
Source Rent Mother Nature
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Edible Vaccines Transgenic Plants Serving Human
Health Needs

• Works like any vaccine
• A transgenic plant with a pathogen protein gene
  is developed
• Potato, banana, and tomato are targets
• Humans eat the plant
• The body produces antibodies against pathogen
  protein
• Humans are immunized against the pathogen
• Examples
• Diarrhea
• Hepatitis B
• Measles

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Next Generation of Ag Biotech Products
Golden Rice increased Vitamin A content by
adding carotene (effort to fight childhood
blindness but not without controversy)
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The Golden Rice Story

• Vitamin A deficiency is a major health problem

• Causes blindness
• Influences severity of diarrhea, measles

• gt100 million children suffer from the problem

• For many countries, the infrastructure doesnt
  exist
• to deliver vitamin pills

• Improved vitamin A content in widely consumed
  crops
• an attractive alternative

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?-Carotene Pathway Problem in Plants
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The Golden Rice Solution
?-Carotene Pathway Genes Added
Daffodil gene
Single bacterial gene performs both functions
Daffodil gene
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Final Test of the Transgenic Consumer Acceptance
RoundUp Ready Corn made by Monsanto genetically
modified to survive weed herbicide
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• Say no to GMO Halifax protesters The Chronicle
  Herald
• halifax n.s against monsanto and g.m.o in our
  food !!! - YouTube

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At over 800 acres (320 ha) and with a population
of over 100,000 cattle, and hundreds harvested
daily, the Harris Ranch is the largest on the
West Coast. It is also among the largest (when
including density) in the United States. A
"vertically integrated" operation, it owns a
fleet of trucks that take cattle from several
ranches with which it deals, and does its own
finishing, slaughtering, and packaging. The ranch
supplies the hamburger meat for the In-N-Out
Burger chain, and also distributes beef and
prepared meals through grocery stores and
restaurants nationwide.
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Directions - Harris Ranch Inn Restaurant -
Coalinga, CA
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• FARMAGEDDON - CALIFORNIA YouTube
• Factory Farm Nation Map Charts Unprecedented
  Growth in Factory Farming in California Food
  Water Watch

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Food Dumping Issue

• Food Dumping results in LDCs because of cheaper
  government subsidized food like grain, rice and
  corn being imported from MDCs like Canada driving
  locals out of business. Poor nations worldwide
  dependence on Cash Crops to be exported for
  economic survival instead of growing to feed the
  hungry in their own nation.
• Food is a commodity with a value that earns
  profits. It should be a human right. IT
  ISNTITS PROPERTY.
• Ironically, we have starvation in a world where
  wheat rots in Canadian grain elevators because
  farmers cant sell it for the price they desire.
• We have starvation in our world of plenty.
• YouTube - Band Aid - Do They Know its Christmas
  1984
• YouTube - Tears Are Not Enough - Northern Lights
• YouTube - USA for Africa - We are the World

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CHAPTER 10

• ..\..\ggs Chapter 10 and foodclips.doc
• Food Inc - YouTube