Venturing deeper into hunger

In my last musing, I noted that hunger is "the single greatest solvable problem in the world".  What I did not note was that this problem is solvable because the world currently produces enough food to feed every single person living today ("Hunger", United Nations Resources for Speakers on Global Issues, http://www.un.org/en/globalissues/briefingpapers/food/index.shtml).  I repeat, we have enough food in the world today to end hunger.  Rather, the research indicates that it is more the impact of economic, environmental, and political reasoning that prevents access to food.    

  

What exactly is hunger?  In economically stable environments where food is affordable, hunger is the uncomfortable sensation experienced in the stomach when a person skips a meal. For the millions of individuals who do not have enough food to eat everyday, the feeling of hunger goes further than that: the individual lacks the strength or energy to undertake the simplest of tasks.  He or she feels weak, tired, unable to concentrate or focus.  The predominant thought on their mind often is "when am I going to eat?"(Ibid).    

   

What causes hunger?  According to the United Nations, key causes of hunger include: natural disasters, conflict, poverty, poor agricultural infrastructure, and the over-exploitation of the environment.  Additionally, changes in global financial and economic markets also have a significant impact on those going without, particularly if food prices rise making sustenance unaffordable for many.  A key example of this is the recent 2008 economic crisis (Ibid).  

  

In the next few musings, I will address hunger as it exists in the developed world.  Too often, the focus is predominantly on hunger that exists in the developing world and although that is entirely justifiable as the majority of the world's hunger population resides in that part of the world, we cannot forget that hunger is a global crisis.  Hunger does not exclude those living in developed nations.   

  

A mark of a developed nation should and must be that the population residing within its borders does not go hungry.  The very fact of their "development" should prohibit this crisis to arise.  However, approximately 19 million of the world's hungry population live within the nations of the developed world.  Many may argue that given the population of the developed world, with the population of the United States alone being greater than 315 million, 19 million does not indicate a population suffering from a hunger crisis.  I would argue that 1 person suffering from hunger is 1 too many.  Still too hard to connect? 

Consider this: What if you were hungry? 

[Hunger Chair by Aoife city womanchile, available under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence 3.0 unported (CC BY 3.0)  at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ The image can be found at http://www.flickr.com/photos/aoifecitywomanchile/2530681611/]  

The next musing will discuss hunger in the United States, followed by musings on hunger in Canada and the UK.