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Global Food Crisis, 7/1/08
Overview:
The director of the World Health Organization (WHO) has said that we are witnessing a “silent tsunami which knows no borders sweeping the world.” He was referring to the incredible rise in food prices worldwide, a crisis that is plunging hundreds of millions of people into poverty, malnutrition and starvation. Join Active Minds as we explore the origins of this growing problem, its impact across the world, and the potential options for solving the crisis.
Key Lecture Points:
• The director of the World Health Organization (WHO) has said that we are witnessing a “silent tsunami which knows no borders sweeping the world”. He was referring to the incredible rise in food prices worldwide, a crisis that is plunging hundreds of millions of people into poverty, malnutrition and starvations, and that is making itself felt even in the pocketbooks of developed-world consumers.
• Between March 2007-March 2008, global corn prices rose 31%, rice 71%, soybeans 87% and wheat 130%. The impact of rising grain prices have been felt everywhere, from markets for livestock to those for beer.
• Rising prices for staple food items, like wheat and rice, that are indispensible to the diets of billions of people around the world, have resulted in food riots across the developing world, where hungry citizens have violently taken to the streets to demand the most basic of necessities. Food riots in Haiti, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Egypt, the Philippines, Thailand and Zimbabwe, among other places, are contributing to the crisis environment surrounding the issue. Even the US government has begun to feel the pressure, with many now calling for a moratorium on ethanol production.
• As the food riots illustrate, rising prices have political consequences for leaders who cannot feed their constituents. Not surprisingly, the potential causes of the crisis, from US biofuel production to rising incomes in India, have also become highly politicized. As US officials place responsibility on the shoulders of India and China, India blames the US for eating too much. Others point to climate change that is impacting growing conditions, while still others argue that rich country agricultural subsidies are at fault. It is likely that many or all of these possible causes have some merit.
• Perhaps most troubling, there appears to be little agreement on potential solutions to the crisis, despite sustained calls from the United Nations and other international groups for global collective action to address the crisis.
Exploration Questions:
• What do you think are the primary cause(s) of the crisis? Who is to blame?
• To what extent does the food crisis shed light on potential future problems from climate change? From rising energy demand and consumption?
• What would you do in a first step to addressing the crisis?
Reflective Questions:
• What foods do you notice that are getting more expensive?
• Do you recall other times in US history when food prices were such a pressing issue?
More to Explore:
• UN Food and Agriculture Organization: www.fao.org
• BBC Coverage of the Food Crisis: http://news.bbc.co.uk
Books For Further Reading:
• Pollan, Michael. The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals. Penguin Press, 2006. 450 pages. Through a detailed discussion of four very different kinds of meals, Pollan explores the intricacies of food production, distribution and consumption. His account stresses the energy needs of current methods of food production, and analyzes the way we eat today. Click here to order.
• Kiple, Kenneth F. A Moveable Feast: Ten Millennia of Food Globalization. Cambridge University Press, 2007. 368 pages. Kiple examines the history of food production beginning with the transition from foraging to farming that got underway some 10,000 years ago in the Fertile Crescent and through to the present. It ends with chapters on genetically modified foods, the fast food industry, the nutritional ailments people have suffered from, famine, the obesity epidemic, and a look at the future on the food front. Click here to order.
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