Deseret News | World hunger reaches the 1 billion people mark

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World hunger reaches the 1 billion people mark

JamesRobertWalton | 8:43 a.m. June 19, 2009

and most of the hunger is directly attributable to Tyrants and dictators like Kim Jong Ill and Achmadneedajob...along with the muslim terrorists in Somalia etc.

Donovan | 10:04 a.m. June 19, 2009

NO, world hunger is caused by overpopulation in general. Over 6 billion people on this worlds surface, and uneducated people are still having huge families.
Go figure!

Naruto | 10:09 a.m. June 19, 2009

I seem to remember a qoute that stated: "Every society is three meals away from anarchy"
Truer words have never been spoken, a civilization that can't eat for one day pushes them to the point of chaos.

Comments continue below

re: JamesRobertWalton | 10:17 a.m. June 19, 2009

Most world hunger is not due to "tyrants and dictators." In fact, that belief contributes to global hunger. It makes those who can help -- like us - think there is nothing we can do about it., but there is:

Just as today's U.S. economy is severely impeded by a lack of capital, so are other parts of the world. The poorer the area, the more they need investment capital.

You and others who want to help should investigate micro-finance organizations, and make a contribution.

The saying, "Give a man a fish, you feed him for a day, teach him how to fish, you feed him for a lifetime" has one flaw: what if there are no fish in the river? That is where micro-finance enters.

Micro-finance organizations fund $100 loans to women who start tiny businesses. Those business generate income to feed those families, hire other people who feed theirs, and pay back the loans.

It is the combination of capital, commitment and creativity which turns poverty into plenty. We can contribute the capital, the women utilize commitment and creativity.

Unitus dot com. Skip a meal. Fund a loan. Feed a family feeding business.

Do something | 10:21 a.m. June 19, 2009

Pontificate, wring your hands, or make a difference.

Contribute to microfinance.

James is right | 11:54 a.m. June 19, 2009

When you have no rule of law, no stable government, dictators who loot every dime out of a country and the foreign aid they can con out stupid countries like ours, then you wind up with no incentive to invest because if you do, some gang of thugs (sometimes who work for your own government!) will come along to take it. I.e. you wind up with poverty, refugees and hunger.

Yes, there are micro-finance organizations in some countries that work wonders. It's not going to do any good in N. Korea, Somalia or Zimbabwe or any other similar country.

Joe Moe | 12:32 p.m. June 19, 2009

How about this: both James and his replier (10:17) are partially right. (11:54) alludes to the fact that there are many causes for hunger in the world. In some cases, tyrants and war are the direct cause. In others, it's just cyclical poverty, in which case we can help more directly and efficiently.

@Donovan (10:04). I'll believe overpopulation is the issue as soon as the world is producing insufficient food to feed everyone. Not only do we have enough food production capacity in the world right now for everyone, this Earth is capable of sustaining much more -- and it will with all the advances in agriculture being made. We just have to stop being idiots, as a race. Stop fighting, stop hoarding, stop wasting.

Reply to Donovan 10:04 | 1:14 p.m. June 19, 2009

I read somewhere that the Earth is capable of producing enough food for Billions and Billions of people. There is plenty of food. The problem is getting it to everyone that needs it. Evil people do prevent this from happening. Among other things. It's a way to control what a populace does, votes for, etc.

Hero of Canton | 1:44 p.m. June 19, 2009

While World Hunger is a serious and saddening issue, I have to wonder about those statistics because according to that, my wife is hungry every day since she is dieting and I am hungry every day since I just don't eat like I should. There needs to be a better statistical pool, people who can't eat and would if they could versus anyone who eats less than 1,800 calories a day.

crisis | 2:46 p.m. June 19, 2009

yet another crisis created by dicators and socialists, and to be remidied by the same?

green | 3:00 p.m. June 19, 2009

Consider Earth as limited every way [a spheroid, finite and unfortunate fossil fuels, oceans sacked already, extinctions now a background hum, vulnerable climate and soil].

Consider humans a cancer on Mother Nature [ignorant and myopic, presumptuous and entitled, spiteful and aggressive, destructive, horny and fertile]. If you think to feed billions you will be outpaced by Population fighting atop eroded or paved former farmland. Where farming began just 13000 years back is now the desolation of Syria [lost cities under sand dunes], Israel, Lebanon [cedars once impressive], and Iraq. Lovely eh?

Where the West just lately arrived the fishing is still impressive : New Zealand. Earth was overpopulated with humans when we destroyed the first species.

To say 'we could' is to ignore 'we do'. The USA models outrageous consumption this world could not sustain. Try to feed such a world! History suggests the future.

Biodiversity should be our treasure and life quality a birthright. Population restrained, fishing and farming sustainable, religion shamed and amputated from government, life valued as rare or unique in the universe : this is right and must be our Constitution. [like campaign finance reform and budget balance]

Joe Moe | 3:34 p.m. June 19, 2009

@green (3:00)

It is rhetoric like yours that earns "greens" a bad name in the eyes of many.

Humans as a "cancer"?

There were too many humans when we "destroyed the first species"?

If you you can find enough self-haters to join you, I guess you can all commit mass suicide/homicide, eradicate the human race, and leave Earth in peace (the way it was meant to be, I might ask?)

By the way, species went extinct, sometimes en masse, long before humans had anything to do with it. Some people seem to believe in Darwin's "survival of the fittest," except when it applies to humans. In which case we are just cancer.

Not to excuse waste, pollution, etc. I believe we have to take care of this planet. It is indeed finite. But your attitude will earn few followers, only a few fanatics. Most of us don't hate us so much.

Donovan | 3:49 p.m. June 19, 2009

Gee, hows the quality of life for the kids and grandkids looking?
It's just grand right now isn't it?
I think of what it was like growing up in the 50's and 60's compared to now and I get sick.
Being packed in a drum, and being fed green pills for dinner just don't sound good to me.
Take a real look around the world folks, its ugly now and will only become worse.
Look what we have done to the ocean, the water, the forest's, the citys, the air.
The world has plenty of room for larger populations?
What a dream land some people live in.

Thanks, Do Something | 5:22 p.m. June 19, 2009

Contributing to microcredit, or micro loans, is a great idea.

Micro loans is lending small amounts of money via the internet to people starting their own businesses.

It can be as little as $50.00. 97% of the loans are paid back.

This has helped thousands of people in developing countries, and here in the US.

An internet organization that does this is Kiva. Or just Google micro loans.

Overpopulation | 5:28 p.m. June 19, 2009

Human beings are subject to the same overpopulation laws of nature as are deer or any other animal.

So there most definitely can be human overpopulation, and it is happening now.

An organization that helps greatly with that is EngenderHealth, one of my favorite charities. Bless them!

No food shortages! | 6:48 p.m. June 19, 2009

The theories on here about the causes of malnutrition are interesting, but I have another thought: Rabid environmentalism. During the 70's a scientist named Norman Borlaug was concerned about rising human populations and impending food shortages. He began experimenting with fertilizers, pesticides and plant breeding. The result of his work produced the famed "green revolution" and food production on the same area of land more than doubled as a result. Environmentalists oppose high yield agriculture saying it harms the evironment (without any evidence or proof I might add). Billions more people eat everyday today, because of high yield agriculture. The next green revolution is already here, it's called genetic engineering, but environmentalists oppose it too. Clearly people, we have the technology to feed the world and food production is almost unlimited. The problem is not the ability to produce enough food, it's rabid environmentalists who want to keep food away from starving children on the pretext of some silly ideas of damaging the planet!

Damaging the planet | 3:29 p.m. June 20, 2009

For information on how agribusiness can be harmful to the health of humans and the land, read the following:

Fatal Harvest: The Tragedy Of Industrial Agriculture, by Andrew Kimbrell

The Botany of Desire: A Plant's-Eye View of the World, by Michael Pollan

The later goes into detail about Idaho potato farming. Very revealing.

One Idaho farmer grows organic potatoes for his own family to eat, because his commercially treated crops, using Monsanto genetically-engineered potatoes and toxic fertilizers, are too poisonous for his family to eat.

Abundance, not scarcity | 4:07 p.m. June 20, 2009

Complex answer. Ultimately there is global hunger due to selfishness.

In part it is due to poor political systems, for never in the history of the world has there been a famine in a democratic nation (presumably because elected officials store up for their constituents through self-interest).

Global hunger is also due to poor allocation of resources since the end of colonization (post WWII), and the second Globalization movement after the collapse of the Soviet empire (1990s). Stiglitz and Sachs would argue that technocrats can solve the problem, and I am sympathetic to the movements. Robert Kaplan is less optimistic (The Coming Anarchy) since food is used evermore as a weapon. I am also persuaded that some future wars will be over water.

As a university professor on the subject and a humanitarian in developing nations for 12 years, I do NOT believe "over population" is the cause of hunger (indeed populations are reversing in many parts of the world, notwithstanding the "bulge"). I believe poor USA, UN, IMF, and World Bank policies are to blame for why more hasn't been done in the past 60 years.

The Earth is abundant, the scarcity is in our thinking.

Overpopulation | 1:37 p.m. June 21, 2009

Overpopulation degrades the environment we need to survive in.

It's happening now, creating habitat loss for people, plants, and animals.

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Altaf Qadri, Associated Press

Indian workers are seen silhouetted as they load rice sacks onto a truck at a grain market on the eve of World Food Day in Amritsar, India, Wednesday.