The Growing Epidemic of Hunger in a World of Plenty

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The Growing Epidemic of Hunger in a World of
Plenty

• West Side Dawgs
• Luke Hamilton, Amanda Tebbetts,
• Kelly Saunders, Amanda Gaines

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Problems

• Hunger is caused not by food scarcity, but
  rather by unequal access to food.
• Anuradha Mittal
• Industrial Agriculture has replaced most local
  farms.
• Ecological principles have been lost and ignored.
• Massive environmental destruction has torn apart
  the social fabric of rural communities.
• Due to this, a massive resistance to industrial
  agriculture has become present around the world.

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Will Industrial Agriculture Feed the World?

• Ag Scientists, Corporate Bigwigs, and Economists
  argue that industrial agriculture is the only
  answer for the more than 800 million people who
  go to bed hungry.
• Agricultural technologies (pesticides, genetic
  engineering) seen as silver bullet solutions to
  global hunger problem.

4
International Food Aid

• Initiated in 1954
• Most publicized instrument in the campaign
  against hunger
• Yet hunger is a bigger crisis now than ever
• Who benefits from food aid?
• -crop lobbies
• -US shipping companies
• -US based relief groups
• US Food Aid most expensive in the world
• Aid is usually too little and too late

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World Hunger Myth

• Abundance, not scarcity, best describes the
  worlds food supply (304)
• Every human can be provided with 3500
  calories/day, or at least 4.3 pounds of
  food/person according to current food
  availability.
• The problem is not of food production, but of
  distribution and access of food.

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Hunger Worldwide

• India
• A top third-world agricultural exporter, yet a
  third of the worlds hungry live there.
• Maintain a sizable buffer stock depriving the
  poor of right to food.
• In 2000 a surplus of wheat was produced. However
  instead of dispersing the extra wheat to the
  hungry, the government put it up for sale and
  export.
• Hunger Video Clip

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Hunger
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Hunger in the U.S.

• 36 Million individuals, 40 being children, have
  uncertain access to food or actual deprivation
• 1 in 10 Americans are hungry or food insecure.
• 29 of the US population of children under 12 go
  hungry
• Infant mortality is closely linked to nutrition
  deficiencies among pregnant women
• More than 1/3 of immigrant households suffer from
  moderate or severe hunger
• Food emergency assistance has increased by an
  average of 17
• Cut backs in federal food programs since the mid
  1990s has caused growing hungry in the richest
  nation on earth

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Organic Farming?

• '"Can organic farming feed the world' is indeed
  a bogus question. The real question is, can we
  feed the world? Period. Can we fix the
  disparities in human nutrition?"
• -Gene Kahn, VP of Sustainable Development for
  General Mills
• Studies have shown that organic food could be a
  positive solution to world hunger.
• Organic farming can be very productive, however,
  it will take decades to completely convert
  current farming practices over.
• A lot of the organic practices are targeted at
  smaller farms and are not practical for large
  scale agricultural production.
• Organic farming can be effective by lowering
  pollution, reducing depletion and erosion, but
  due to requirements of rotating crops, a lot more
  land would need to be utilized at the cost of
  forest and other protected land environments.

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Green Revolution

• Myths
• China eliminated, the number of hungry people in
  the rest of the world increased by more than 11
• In South America and South Asia, food supply rose
  and the number of hungry people also increased
• Paradox of Plenty
• More food and more hunger
• Modern day technology will not end hunger, but
  rather living wage and genuinely end reform
• Combating hunger and poverty that causes hunger,
  industrial agriculture and biotechnology are
  unlikely to help

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Solutions

• Keep genetic resources in the public domain
• Resist the privatization of biodiversity
• Oppose limits on corporate monopolies
• Free academic institutions and regulatory
  industries from corporate influence
• Impose a moratorium on the commercial use of
  genetically engineered crops

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Thoughts from da Hood
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Works Cited

• http//www.google.com
• http//www.yahoo.com
• Halweil, Brian. World Watch, Can Organic
  Farming Feed Us All?, May/Jun2006, Vol. 19, Issue
  3.
• Kimbrell, Andrew. Fatal Harvest The Tragedy of
  Industrial Agriculture. 2002. P 303-305.
• Mousseau, Frederic and Mittal, Anuradha. The
  Humanist. Food Sovereignty Ending World Hunger
  in Our Time. April 2006. P. 24-26