yelamdenu

Hunger is the most degrading thing, and the present global food crisis is manmade. High biofuel prices due to the expected Peak Oil crisis, agricultural subsidies by the rich economies, shameless stock market speculation, and overconsumption of meat in the richer parts of the world all culminate in people dying of hunger and rioting over food in countries like India and Egypt.

United Nations general secretary Ban Kimun (Ban Ki Moon) said the same thing, in case you think I made this up.

Nothing is more degrading than hunger. Especially when it is man-made. It breeds anger, social disintegration, ill health, and economic decline.

Today’s problem will only grow larger tomorrow, unless we act now, today. I call on you to take bold and urgent steps to address the root causes of this global food crisis. We want the firm commitment to moving ahead.

 Women and children are paying the highest price, say experts. Unlike most Western television channels, Al-Jazeera actually pays some substantial attention to the food crisis, so I would like to suggest anyone to watch the following Al-Jazeera program.

You have read the statement of the secretary general of the United Nations, who also speaks in the program, now let’s watch and listen to the anger and energy of Vandana Shiva (Al-Jazeera, Youtube), who gives us the shameful facts.

I have taken the minor effort of writing it down here.

 

Interviewer:

Let’s bring in Vandana Shiva from Delhi, … You [Sarris, FAO] mention a multitude of possible factors here, Mrs. Shiva in Delhi, one of the factors that Mr Sarris mentioned was this theory that China and India are consuming much more, which contributes to the crisis. In your opinion, how much weight does that theory have?

Vandana Shiva:

Well, I would have expected the Food and Agriculture Organisation to be a little more responsible. President Bush made that statement a few weeks ago, the biofuel industry put huge ads in the International Herald Tribune, to say it was the Asians, Indians, Chinese eating more, rather than biofuel diversion. The first point is, India’s consumption increased two percent over the last year in cereals; United States consumption of cereals increased 12%, and most of that was for biofuel.

So if we are looking at the pressure, it’s coming quite clearly from the United States for biofuels, not from countries like India. In fact, India’s production has increased, it has kept up with population growth; this year’s harvest has been tremendous. The real reason for the rise in food prices is the forced integration of local economies into an international economy controlled by speculative monopolies. If five grain giants control the food trade, it doesn’t matter how much food there is in the world, they will make their superprofits.

And Cargill’s profits have clearly doubled over the last year, while a hundred million people, increased numbers, went into hunger. A second very big reason for the decline in food availability at the local level, is a very false model of increasing agricultural production. It went by the name of the green revolution, it goes by the name of industrial agriculture, unfortunately the World Bank’s package of one billion dollars for increased investment to the South is in the form of new seeds, largely non-renewable, seeds for monocultures, and fertilisers, chemical fertilisers.

This package is a disaster for poor countries. First, the farmers get into debt, they have to sell their food, and, can’t buy it back at the price at which they sold it. Secondly, climate change is caused 25% by industrial agriculture. You add another 10%, with rising fuel prices, to trade, international trade in food; unnecessary food miles, you’re talking about, 40% greenhouse gas emissions, coming from a non-sustainable industrial farming system.

We could solve the climate problem, ánd the food problem, tomorrow, with investments; but not the level of investments the World Bank is talking about. By supporting ecological agriculture, supporting local economies, as Sylvia Borren talked about, and the most important point is, the International Assessment on Agricultural Science and Technology, sponsored by the World Bank, says this is the only way.

Our overconsumption of meat and our governments funding its production, our use of biofuel and our unwillingness to address the subsidising and dumping of agricultural products that destroy local agriculture, the fact we endure in our industrialised, modern, Western, democratic midst criminal enterprises like Monsanto, all this is our contribution to people, most of whom women and children, dying of hunger ever day.