Approximately 1 billion people worldwide live in hunger, despite the fact that there is enough food on the planet to feed all 7 billion of the world’s living humans. Here are five world hunger solutions:
1. Feeding Programs and Food Aid Donations
Probably the most obvious of the five solutions, the most immediate, if not the most sustainable, way to end hunger is to put food directly in the hands of those who are hungry. Feeding programs and efficient food aid donations have proven to be an extremely effective way of doing so.
Getting food to the hungry until they are able to produce it themselves is not a matter of implementing feeding programs and donating food – it’s about making the programs that already exist more effective. For instance, the Food for Peace Reform Act of 2014 that was introduced in Congress on June 3 strives to greatly increase the economic effectiveness of U.S. food aid by ending requirements that food aid must be purchased domestically rather than locally, a requirement that significantly drives up the price of food.
By turning a careful eye to the programs that are in place today and making slight reforms to them where necessary, it is possible to feed millions more people around the world.
2. Education and School Meals
Providing all school-aged children with a proper education is one of the most effective ways of ensuring that they don’t face hunger as adults. By providing kids with the knowledge and skills to procure jobs, education prepares them to be self-sufficient in the real world.
It’s important, though, to make sure that children are fed while they’re in school. Not only does this encourage them (especially those children who do not receive enough to eat at home) to come to school, but it also increases their focus and improves their performance while they’re in the classroom.
3. Sustainable, Practical and Dependable Agriculture
Implementing sustainable, practical and dependable agriculture is a three-fold task: international aid organizations must work with farmers and communities to promote vegetarian diets, embrace GMOs and adopt urban farming practices. Only by accomplishing each of these tasks will hungry communities be able to produce enough food to sustain themselves in the immediate future.
Why vegetarian? It can be a hard sell, it’s true – especially in places where meat is already a large portion of the local cuisine or plays a role in a cultural tradition. While we certainly don’t want to interfere in local cultures, reducing the global demand for meat is an important step toward making more food available for the hungry. It is estimated that for every 100 calories fed to a cow, a human will reap only 2.5 calories from eating its beef. Calorically, raising livestock for the sole purpose of eventually consuming them is extremely expensive. By decreasing the size of the meat industry, we could simultaneously decrease worldwide hunger.
Genetically-modified organisms, or GMOs, are another controversial topic. GMOs indisputably play a large role in helping the hungry, especially in nations where meteorological events are wreaking havoc on the agricultural yield. Some GMOs are specifically modified to be more resistant to droughts or floods than are conventional organisms, making them especially hardy in tropical and arid regions of the world. Planting GMOs in nations with extreme climates makes their populations less vulnerable to hunger. Better yet, many GMOs are nutritionally-enriched.
Urban farming has also captured headlines recently, but is usually cast in a positive light. That’s because the practice makes efficient use of urban space that is often overlooked and underused. Poverty is becoming an increasingly-urbanized affliction, with over 28 percent of poverty worldwide occurring in cities. In Asia, a staggering 50 percent of the impoverished live in urban areas. In order to get food into urban areas, it’s time we start producing food in urban areas. Urban farming is the answer to increasing food security in cities. It’s already proven to be extremely effective at reducing hunger for those living in Indian slums.
These agricultural adaptations certainly won’t come easy in many parts of the world, but implementing these changes even over a period of time is sure to yield major results.
4. Women
Despite making up more than half of the world’s population, women often exercise less agency when it comes to decision-making and have less access to resources such as education than do their male counterparts. These inequalities are just part of the reason why women experience hunger at higher rates than men do. Ironically, it’s women who do most of the world’s agricultural work. In Africa, 80 percent of farm workers are women; unfortunately, though they work with food all day, many of them don’t have enough of their own to keep themselves and their families well-nourished.
Investing in these women, however, is an unexpected way of bringing world hunger to an end. Typically, food goes farther in the hands of women than in the hands of men – it is more likely to nourish more members of the family, especially children. In regards to children, pregnant women are particularly in need of adequate nutrients – healthy mothers bear healthy kids.
Giving a woman food and the power to afford and obtain her own food in the future is the best way of ensuring that she and her family do not suffer from hunger. In Brazil, children are 20 percent more likely to survive to adulthood when their mothers control the family’s income. It’s time to invest in women – investing in them is investing in ending hunger.
Another way the U.S. can invest in women is by making contraception affordable, accessible and understandable to them worldwide. Globally, we’re facing a crisis of overpopulation, and more mouths are more difficult to feed. Lowering worldwide fertility rates is a key part of solving hunger.
5. Infants
Babies are particularly vulnerable to disease and infection, and hunger and malnutrition only exaggerate that weakness. By giving babies a healthy, well-nourished start to life, we give them a greater chance at making it to adulthood.
How does this end world hunger? Healthy children can attend school, grow up to find employment and make better lives for their own children. A healthy populace begins at birth.
World hunger isn’t going to end tomorrow. But by understanding some of the tactics we can use to end it, we might sooner bring about a world where everyone is well-fed, healthy and happy.
– Elise L. Riley
Sources: The Guardian 1, The Guardian 2, Food for Life, Borgen Project, World Watch, WFP
Paran: A Town of Peaches and the Blind
Paran is a small community that rests at the foothills of the Andes in Lima, Peru. It is an isolated little area surrounded by mountains and home to only 300 people, and one in eight of those people are blind.
The unusual rate of blindness in Paran was discovered about two years ago when a mining company sent a team of doctors to the area as an outreach effort. Most of the Paranos had never visited a doctor before then, and therefore had no one to report the condition to although they understood it was abnormal.
The blind and their families were hoping for treatment or glasses to cure the affliction but they were given an even more complicated prognosis. Doctors found that the condition was caused by a genetic mutation in the X chromosome. This means that women can carry it, but men are more likely to express symptoms.
The condition works by knocking out cells in the retina like pixels in a screen. Victims experience blurriness in their vision that gradually worsens until all sight is lost. Onset takes place between the ages of 10 and 40 and the ability to see at night is lost early on.
While the discovery of the disease, named retinitis pigmentosa, was a breakthrough for the people of Paran whose ancestors have dealt with the condition for over a hundred years, many feel that they were given life-changing information and then abandoned.
The discovery of the disease two years ago brought a lot of attention to the area by doctors and journalists alike. When the doctors left and Paran became yesterday’s news, the people were left without a cure and a bad reputation. What was once known as a village with sweet peaches became the town of the blind.
Even to this day the people of Paran carry a stigma and are treated as outcasts by the surrounding areas. They are unwanted out of fear of contaminating other populations and told to move far away if they choose to leave their community. The women of Paran are avoided as spouses out of fear they may pass the disease onto their children.
However, despite what may seem like bleak circumstances, the Paranos persist with amazing vigor. With no government assistance or facilities fit to accommodate blindness, the men in the area prepare for a life of darkness before total blindness sets in. People like Lorenzo, an elderly man with nobody to care for him, make the two-hour trek up and down the rocky hills they live on to the village center every day on their own.
Another man named Agapito Mateo and his two brothers are all blind. Agapito is a pastor and a farmer who never stopped tending to his peaches after losing his sight. He thanks God for his ability to continue working but insists that those less fortunate need government assistance. Meanwhile, people like Agapito work to uphold the reputation that Paran may be home to a good number of blind men, but they also grow really sweet peaches.
– Edward Heinrich
Sources: Oscar Durand, PRI, YouTube
Four Ways Sustainable Agriculture Reduces Poverty
Sufficient and suitable food supply is necessary for eliminating food poverty and hunger. The world needs to intensify efforts to transform agriculture. It is necessary to increase total farm productivity in developing countries where food is needed most. Sustainable agriculture seeks to makes the most efficient use of natural goods by integrating certain process such as soil regeneration, nitrogen fixation and nutrient cycling into food production processes. It ensures minimal use of non-renewable resources that hurt the environment and it makes resourceful use of farmers’ skills and social capital (people’s abilities to work together to solve problems.) Sustainable agriculture technology is always modified locally. Listed below are four ways sustainable agriculture reduces poverty.
1. Significant Increases in Food Production
As a result of sustainable agriculture, increases have appeared as yield improvements or as more diversity of produce. For the 4.42 million farmers on 3.58 million hectares, average food production per household increased by 73 percent. For the 146,000 farmers on 542,000 hectares cultivating roots, food production increased by 150 percent. For the larger farms in Latin America, average size of 90 hectares per farm, total production increased by 46 percent.
2. Three-Step Process Leads to Self-Sufficiency
A small, enclosed garden is the first of the three steps. With instruction and materials like equipment and seed, this can supply nutrition for a family. In step two, the family adds a diverse selection of crops to their fields. In step three, the animals chosen are usually smaller animals like goats, sheep, guinea pigs, rabbits or chickens. These animals provide beneficial protein for the family.
3. Creates Community
As each family experiences success with their farm, they pass their knowledge on to their neighbors and community. As families share ideas and goods, they create a close-knit community.
4. Sustainable Agriculture Programs Build an Educated Population
Self-sufficiency indicates a healthier family with the confidence to work hard and maybe even the initiative to get an education and participate more in the community.
– Colleen Moore
Sources: Huff Post, World Bank
Child Malnutrition in Cote d’Ivoire
For the past six years, the rate of chronic child malnutrition in Cote d’Ivoire has remained at a whopping 40 percent. This is slightly higher than the overall population’s malnutrition rate, which is a solid 30 percent. The Ivory Coast, located on the coastal edge of Western Africa, experiences high malnutrition rates due to a multitude of factors including high food prices and inadequate food access, which is a consequence of hot, dry weather.
Tumultuous political circumstances from the early to late 2000s divided Cote d’Ivoire into North and South; rebels then controlled its northern region. As a result, government and public services in the north were wrecked, the economy collapsed and food access was scarcer than ever. Health and food distribution services were no longer functional. Thankfully, in 2008 its government created nutrition centers in the north and east, of which there are now 14.
Yet, the regions exhibiting the highest chronic rate of malnutrition in Cote d’Ivoire are Bafing, Worodougou and Montagnes. Additionally, the Savanes, Worodougou and Montagnes regions exhibit the highest concentrated rates of consequent stunted growth. Widespread national poverty as well as thousands of displaced peoples further complicate the dire circumstances.
It is evident that Cote d’Ivoire’s government lacks the funds necessary to effectively combat its malnutrition problems. A few humanitarian organizations have assisted, most notably Action Against Hunger (ACF) from 2002 to 2011. ACF’s aid ceased abruptly when its funds were depleted. The organization retracted much of its aid and missionaries, a circumstance that somewhat reversed the critical progress it had contributed.
Diarrassouba Issouf, an official at the Family Protection Unit in Korhogo, said that the humanitarian organizations’ exits left primary areas without food and resulted in fewer women visiting nutrition sites.
Cote d’Ivoire’s stagnating and critical malnutrition levels, especially in young children, demands immediate attention. With more international humanitarian assistance and aid, more lasting improvement may be on Cote d’Ivoire’s horizon.
– Arielle Swett
Sources: All Africa, Action Against Hunger, UNICEF
Photo: News Wire
3 Things the U.S. Can Do to Reduce Global Poverty
The United States has one of the biggest economies in the world, yet spends only a small portion of its money on ending global poverty. As one of the most influential agenda-setters and biggest economic and military forces, the U.S. must accept its responsibility to the global project to reduce global poverty. There are several ways the U.S. is already tackling the issue, but it could certainly do more. These three specific methods are already in place, but need to be expanded upon in order to allow the U.S. to fulfill its potential in humanitarian aid. To play its role in reducing global poverty, the U.S. government must…
1. Pass bills.
Bills like the Electrify Africa Act and the Global Food Security Act are crucial to ending global poverty, and rely entirely on the U.S. people and government to be a success.
Take Electrify Africa for example. This bill would help provide electricity to 50 million people in Africa. This progress is essential for providing better security, health care and housing for families in need and is crucial for ending global poverty and inequality. The U.S. government is in an important role to make sure this step is taken. Luckily, the Electrify Africa Act has already seen huge success on the floor of the House of Representatives and was passed with overwhelming bipartisan support. Now it moves into the Senate, where it has already been read and referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations. The U.S. government has a responsibility to pass bills like this one in order to work toward ending global poverty.
2. Give more funding to foreign aid.
When it comes to the amount given as foreign aid, the U.S. ranks 19th in the world. This is simply unacceptable. The U.S. has one of the most powerful economies, yet it ranks 11th of 22 major donors for quality of foreign aid. Only 1.5 percent of the federal budget goes toward international affairs, as compared to 23.6 percent on social security or 18.4 percent on defense spending.
In order to effectively end global poverty, the U.S. must increase their foreign aid, specifically by increasing the budget of the U.S. Agency on International Development (USAID), which oversees all international humanitarian efforts the U.S. is involved in. This money is used to assist developing nations by fighting endemic disease, providing emergency aid after natural disasters and implementing agricultural programs to increase food security. The more aid that goes to these projects, the more successful they can be in ending global poverty and treating its side effects.
3. Work with other governments and international organizations.
The U.S. does have domestic issues to worry about, and as a result, cannot logically put all its energy into fighting global poverty. But it can work with and support international organizations that do just that. In the recent past, USAID, which is the U.S. powerhouse for international assistance projects, has worked with UNICEF and other international aid organizations on programs that tackle issues like poor nutrition in African countries and social development in Nigeria. U.S. collaboration with international organizations through the USAID allows the U.S. to have a role in reducing global poverty. The U.S. government should facilitate more of this type of partnership between USAID and other international aid organizations in order to live up to its obligation to work toward reducing poverty around the world.
Foreign aid and humanitarian assistance are complicated issues when taken in the context of the entire U.S. government, but it is crucial that the U.S. does not forget its responsibility to ending world poverty and continue to work toward this goal. The U.S., as one of the world’s most powerful nations, has the ability to make a significant difference in the world on extreme poverty through several methods and it is our job to ensure that our government stays on track toward achieving this mission.
– Caitlin Thompson
Sources: Leadership News, USAID, Center for Global Development, The concord Coalition, Oxfam America, The White House, Govtrack, Congress.gov, ONE, Vanguard
Photo: WPR
10 Hungriest Countries and the Reason Why
This year, 870 million people in the will face continual, day to day hunger. Ninety-eight percent of these hungry people live in developing countries, even though these countries are the ones producing much of the world’s food.
In October 2013, international humanitarian organization Concern Worldwide published a list of the 10 hungriest countries in the world, most of which were in Africa. The list includes Burundi, Eritrea, Comoros, Timor Leste, Sudan, Chad, the Yemen Republic, Ethiopia, Madagascar and Zambia. Patterns as to why these particular countries are hungry have strong historical correlations.
Here are five reasons why these countries are suffering from hunger.
1. Landlocked countries are resource scarce
Countries like Burundi and Chad are landlocked, and they struggle to connect with the coastal areas of Africa. Landlocked countries as a whole have poor transportation links to the coast, either by their own fault or through developmentally and infrastructurally challenged neighbors. Without access to the coast, it’s difficult to integrate with global markets. Thus, they are also cut off from global flows of knowledge, technology and innovation, and unable to benefit completely from trade. Often, the cost of transportation for importing and exporting raw materials is exorbitantly high. Burundi experiences 6 percent less economic growth than non-landlocked countries in Africa, and as many as 58 percent of Burundi‘s citizens are chronically malnourished.
2. Productive land remains unused
In some countries, land is not being effectively used. In Eritrea, almost a quarter of the country’s productive land remains unused following the 1998-2000 Eritrean-Ethiopian war. The war displaced nearly 1 million Eritreans, leaving the country with a need for skilled agricultural workers, as well as plaguing the lands with mines. There is a lot of potentially fertile land in Africa, but the majority of farmers don’t have the technology or means to use the land to its full value. Because of these discrepancies, incomes remain low.
3. War and violence destroy country infrastructure
Countries with a low level of income, slow economic growth, and a dependence on commodity exports are prone to civil war – and most of the hungriest countries have experienced war and violence for decades. Once a cycle of violence and civil war begins in a country, it’s hard to break the pattern. Timor Leste is still paying for seeking independence from Indonesia, which damaged the country’s infrastructure. Sudan is slowly recovering from two civil wars and war in the Darfur region. Chad has had tensions between its northern and southern ethnic groups for years, which has contributed to its political and economic instability.
4. Extreme climate conditions and climate change
Sometimes, causes for hunger are unavoidable – like weather. The 2011 Horn of Africa drought left 4.5 million people in Ethiopia hungry, and since 85 percent of the population earns their income from agriculture, any drought has a detrimental impact on Ethiopians. As an island off the coast of Africa, Madagascar is especially prone to natural disasters like cyclones and flooding, and experienced its worst locust plague yet in 2013. Climate change is also viewed as a current and future cause of world hunger. Changing climatic patterns across the globe require changes in crops and farming practices that will not be easy to adjust to.
5. Increasing refugee populations
Finally, the presence of refugees in a country adds to the growing pressure on already limited resources. This is the case in Chad, which has over 400,000 refugees from Sudan and the Central African Republic due to political instability and ethnic violence in those countries. Ethiopia is also home to refugees, but because of a different reason – the country continues to welcome refugees from Sudan, South Sudan and Somalia after the Horn of Africa drought.
— Rachel Reed
Sources: GCC, Global Citizen, U.N., WHES
Photo: Mirror
Effects of the Waste Problem in Haiti
Haiti is progressively becoming overrun with mountains of waste in the streets because there is absolutely nowhere to put it.
The trash and waste problem in Haiti is an ongoing nightmare for the people living there, with garbage filling the streets. Haiti has few landfills or dumpsters, and there is no apparent place to dispose of its increasing volume of waste.
The problem peaked in 2012, and imported plastic products were banned. These products were blocking drains and paths and clogging the streets so badly that there was flooding.
This flooding problem subsequently destroyed businesses, homes and other property. Stagnant water posed a serious health issue in the most impoverished areas; it allowed mosquitos to flourish and disease to spread.
The smell of the garbage and the poor overall appearance of Haiti (most specifically the capital, Port-Au-Prince) have destroyed the economy and led to extreme decreases in tourism.
In addition to being odorous and detrimental to tourism, decaying waste produces methane gas. When inhaled, this gas can cause serious long-term lung, heart and brain defects.
Most disturbingly, a report from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency also predicts that waste-generation rates will more than double over the next 20 years in lower-income countries like Haiti, where trash is already so abundant that people have to climb over or wade through it to get anywhere.
This means that the number of people migrating to urban cities such as Port-au-Prince will increase — a population spike that will manifest itself in the production of a proportionate amount of litter in the streets. This transition will require employment of a vital, comprehensive national management plan.
The most logical step to rid cities like Port-Au-Prince in Haiti of waste is recycling.
Volunteers and organizations in Haiti can gather the waste from the streets and exchange the plastics, papers, etc., for cash to help private businesses overseas. In turn, the waste can also be turned into functional packaging for the future use of Haitian companies.
This means Haitians in impoverished areas can exchange their waste both for profit and cleaner streets that will not flood or draw disease-ridden mosquitoes.
Citizens who take the time to make the streets a little cleaner can often make about $52 a week. This is not a bad wage, considering many of the people in Haiti can live off $1 a day. Their aid in cleaning the city will also help eliminate major disease and illness factors in the area.
A plan has been put in place to get more volunteers to join the fight to rid Haiti of waste before its urban areas become overpopulated. The country’s impoverished people can improve their streets, communities, environment and national economy by simply recycling waste products.
– Cara Morgan
Sources: Aid Volunteers, The Guardian
Photo: Idea Peepshow
Reconstruction After Typhoon Haiyan
In November 2013, Typhoon Haiyan struck the Philippines and devastated hospitals, schools and other public services. With an estimated $12 billion in damages, the disaster killed at least 6,300 people, displaced more than 4 million and destroyed 500,000 homes.
Six months later, the nation continues to work toward long-term recovery, but there have been clear immediate achievements. Most children are back in school, roads have been cleared of debris, 15 percent of homes have been repaired, nearly all hospitals have been reopened and over 120,000 households have received assistance to rebuild damages.
Of the 14 million people affected by Typhoon Haiyan, 6 million lost their jobs. The United Nations, various NGO partners and the rest of the international humanitarian community have helped accelerate the progress of reconstruction and recover long-lasting sources of income. In the meantime, a number of short-term initiatives have been implemented as well. The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and several of its partners have helped many Filipinos find short-term employment, job training and micro-enterprise support. Immediately after the typhoon, the UNDP also offered cash-for-work opportunities for those who helped with debris and waste removal in affected areas. Additionally, of the 42,000 people who have secured temporary jobs through the UNDP’s early recovery program in the Visayas, 35 percent are women.
However, millions of Filipinos still require urgent assistance. More than 5,000 households live in evacuation centers. Those who depend on agriculture and fishing for their incomes are suffering as well. The UNDP estimates that over 1 million farming families are in danger of losing their livelihoods. Nearly 33 million coconut trees – which are one of the nation’s leading crops – have been damaged or destroyed, and around two-thirds of the fishing community has been affected by the typhoon, primarily due to the loss of fishing boats. To help alleviate the issue of damaged coconut trees in Roxas and Ormoc, the UNDP has provided six mobile sawmills and funds to support emergency employment, allowing many to generate quick sources of income from processing and distributing the lumber of damaged coconut trees.
In order to lessen the impact of future disasters like Typhoon Haiyan, the Filipino government is planning to implement more sustainable reconstruction strategies. Recently, more than 150 delegates came together at the Asia-Europe Meeting Manila Conference to discuss new policies for disaster preparation. Margareta Wahlström, a special representative from the United Nations, has supported President Aquino’s policy to “build back better” with new technologies and innovations. Other points of discussion during the conference included improving policies to rebuild communities, strengthening the state and other stakeholders and managing international coordination while responding to disasters. The delegates at the conference also toured Barangay Pago, a resettlement area that shelters 40 displaced families, and the Bislig Elementary School in Tanauan.
UNDP Administrator Helen Clark has stated that full recovery could take over a decade for the Philippines. The UNDP has urged the international community to make long-term engagements that address “crises that could deepen inequality and poverty.” In addition to rebuilding physical buildings and structures, the Philippines must take measures to strengthen its resilience against future emergencies and natural disasters.
– Kristy Liao
Sources: India Blooms, UNDP, UNOCHA
Photo: U.N.
5 World Hunger Solutions
Approximately 1 billion people worldwide live in hunger, despite the fact that there is enough food on the planet to feed all 7 billion of the world’s living humans. Here are five world hunger solutions:
1. Feeding Programs and Food Aid Donations
Probably the most obvious of the five solutions, the most immediate, if not the most sustainable, way to end hunger is to put food directly in the hands of those who are hungry. Feeding programs and efficient food aid donations have proven to be an extremely effective way of doing so.
Getting food to the hungry until they are able to produce it themselves is not a matter of implementing feeding programs and donating food – it’s about making the programs that already exist more effective. For instance, the Food for Peace Reform Act of 2014 that was introduced in Congress on June 3 strives to greatly increase the economic effectiveness of U.S. food aid by ending requirements that food aid must be purchased domestically rather than locally, a requirement that significantly drives up the price of food.
By turning a careful eye to the programs that are in place today and making slight reforms to them where necessary, it is possible to feed millions more people around the world.
2. Education and School Meals
Providing all school-aged children with a proper education is one of the most effective ways of ensuring that they don’t face hunger as adults. By providing kids with the knowledge and skills to procure jobs, education prepares them to be self-sufficient in the real world.
It’s important, though, to make sure that children are fed while they’re in school. Not only does this encourage them (especially those children who do not receive enough to eat at home) to come to school, but it also increases their focus and improves their performance while they’re in the classroom.
3. Sustainable, Practical and Dependable Agriculture
Implementing sustainable, practical and dependable agriculture is a three-fold task: international aid organizations must work with farmers and communities to promote vegetarian diets, embrace GMOs and adopt urban farming practices. Only by accomplishing each of these tasks will hungry communities be able to produce enough food to sustain themselves in the immediate future.
Why vegetarian? It can be a hard sell, it’s true – especially in places where meat is already a large portion of the local cuisine or plays a role in a cultural tradition. While we certainly don’t want to interfere in local cultures, reducing the global demand for meat is an important step toward making more food available for the hungry. It is estimated that for every 100 calories fed to a cow, a human will reap only 2.5 calories from eating its beef. Calorically, raising livestock for the sole purpose of eventually consuming them is extremely expensive. By decreasing the size of the meat industry, we could simultaneously decrease worldwide hunger.
Genetically-modified organisms, or GMOs, are another controversial topic. GMOs indisputably play a large role in helping the hungry, especially in nations where meteorological events are wreaking havoc on the agricultural yield. Some GMOs are specifically modified to be more resistant to droughts or floods than are conventional organisms, making them especially hardy in tropical and arid regions of the world. Planting GMOs in nations with extreme climates makes their populations less vulnerable to hunger. Better yet, many GMOs are nutritionally-enriched.
Urban farming has also captured headlines recently, but is usually cast in a positive light. That’s because the practice makes efficient use of urban space that is often overlooked and underused. Poverty is becoming an increasingly-urbanized affliction, with over 28 percent of poverty worldwide occurring in cities. In Asia, a staggering 50 percent of the impoverished live in urban areas. In order to get food into urban areas, it’s time we start producing food in urban areas. Urban farming is the answer to increasing food security in cities. It’s already proven to be extremely effective at reducing hunger for those living in Indian slums.
These agricultural adaptations certainly won’t come easy in many parts of the world, but implementing these changes even over a period of time is sure to yield major results.
4. Women
Despite making up more than half of the world’s population, women often exercise less agency when it comes to decision-making and have less access to resources such as education than do their male counterparts. These inequalities are just part of the reason why women experience hunger at higher rates than men do. Ironically, it’s women who do most of the world’s agricultural work. In Africa, 80 percent of farm workers are women; unfortunately, though they work with food all day, many of them don’t have enough of their own to keep themselves and their families well-nourished.
Investing in these women, however, is an unexpected way of bringing world hunger to an end. Typically, food goes farther in the hands of women than in the hands of men – it is more likely to nourish more members of the family, especially children. In regards to children, pregnant women are particularly in need of adequate nutrients – healthy mothers bear healthy kids.
Giving a woman food and the power to afford and obtain her own food in the future is the best way of ensuring that she and her family do not suffer from hunger. In Brazil, children are 20 percent more likely to survive to adulthood when their mothers control the family’s income. It’s time to invest in women – investing in them is investing in ending hunger.
Another way the U.S. can invest in women is by making contraception affordable, accessible and understandable to them worldwide. Globally, we’re facing a crisis of overpopulation, and more mouths are more difficult to feed. Lowering worldwide fertility rates is a key part of solving hunger.
5. Infants
Babies are particularly vulnerable to disease and infection, and hunger and malnutrition only exaggerate that weakness. By giving babies a healthy, well-nourished start to life, we give them a greater chance at making it to adulthood.
How does this end world hunger? Healthy children can attend school, grow up to find employment and make better lives for their own children. A healthy populace begins at birth.
World hunger isn’t going to end tomorrow. But by understanding some of the tactics we can use to end it, we might sooner bring about a world where everyone is well-fed, healthy and happy.
– Elise L. Riley
Sources: The Guardian 1, The Guardian 2, Food for Life, Borgen Project, World Watch, WFP
10 Ways to Make Every Foreign Aid Dollar Count
Public opinion about U.S. foreign assistance has remained unchanged for many decades. It is still not unusual for people to choose foreign aid when it comes to deciding where to cut funding to reduce the national deficit.
For decades, pollsters continue to show us how most people think that foreign aid accounts for over 20 percent of the federal budget. In fact, foreign aid accounts for only 1 percent of the federal budget. What is more, of that 1 percent, only half is dedicated to helping the world’s poor.
Despite the limited amount of foreign aid, and the fact that it is always in danger of being cut further, there are several ways in which we can make our foreign aid dollars count. Here are 10 ways to make every foreign aid dollar count; some of which are already being put in practice.
1. Engage recipients of foreign aid as part of the solution.
Instead of treating people in foreign countries as “passive recipients” of money and food, it has been demonstrated that it is much more productive to include them in the process of formulating and implementing poverty reduction initiatives.
2. Transfer some of the responsibilities to local authorities.
Following up with the previous point, another way of engaging with aid recipients is to delegate some of the work to local authorities. Involving local authorities in the design and implementation of aid policies promises to create better results.
3. Use technological advances to improve data management.
Putting to work the many tools available is crucial for gathering data and monitoring the achievements of each aid program. For instance, the State Department launched a website called “dashboard” where all foreign aid programs can be monitored.
4. Create new partnerships and strengthen existing ones with private businesses.
Partnering with businesses and nonprofit organizations provides additional funding sources that helps leverage the small amount dedicated to foreign assistance by the federal government.
5. No private without public.
At the same time, it is imperative not to deviate too much from public funding sources. In the last decade there has been a growing notion that private organizations can gather enough funding for foreign aid. However, according to Paul Farmer, no intervention can be brought to a scale large enough to make a difference without some input from the state.
6. Do independent scientific research.
This is another tool to determine what really works and what does not. More importantly, it is a means to disaggregate politically motivated foreign programs from the ones that would create a real impact on poverty alleviation.
7. Centralize data for better monitoring of aid programs.
Creating an integral database for foreign aid helps identify redundant programs, eliminating waste. In addition, it is an effective way to determine goal-based foreign assistance and monitor the achievements accordingly.
8. Move away from one-size-fits all policies.
In countries with relatively stable governments, it makes sense to implement programs that rely on “country ownership” and more “participatory processes.” However, this might not be possible in countries with governance and corruption issues.
9. Tie aid to goals with measurable results.
This way both donors and recipients can be held more accountable for specific achievements. This will require moving away from generalized goals toward specifying the particular quality and scope for each program.
10. Reassess the way in which foreign aid is allocated based on risk factors.
This last point speaks directly to reassessing expectation. It is important to be realistic when it comes to foreign assistance. Under the best circumstances, there are still many factors that can hinder the progress made in poverty reduction programs. However, studying the risk involved in each case specifically can be a way to improve the chances of success.
There is no single answer to development and poverty alleviation. Foreign aid can be a lengthy and risky business. But using the tools at our disposal and learning from past experience is still a good way to achieve a growing number of successes.
– Sahar Abi Hassan
Sources: Politix, Foreign Affairs
Photo: The Economist
How to End Hunger Around the World
Currently, around 1 billion people live in hunger around the world. That’s the same amount as the total populations of the United States, Canada and the European Union combined.
Nearly 98 percent of hunger around the world exists in developing countries, and 62.4 percent of people living in hunger live in Asia and the South Pacific.
However, the number of people living in hunger is not caused by a lack of food. The world produces enough food to feed the entire global population, but the people living in hunger have neither the land nor the money to acquire food.
Poverty is the main cause of hunger, just as hunger is a cause of poverty. When people go without food, it causes the brain to lose functionality so that they cannot contribute to their economy and allow it to grow. Providing the additional calories needed by the 13 percent of the world’s population living in hunger would require just 1 percent of the current global food supply.
There has been some development in terms of reducing hunger — the governments of Brazil and Ghana have significantly cut the number of people living in hunger by providing aid to their poor, raising their minimum wage and investing in small farms, especially those owned by women.
There are ways that global hunger can be stopped, though. One way is to prevent land grabbing. One of the negative aspects of the uncertainty of future food supply are wealthy yet small nations, like South Korea or the Gulf countries, gaining land from developing countries to use as additional farms.
Another way to prevent global hunger is to block out speculators from the global market. Since the financial crisis of 2008, money from investment funds have flooded the commodities market. The automated trading systems make it difficult for traditional traders to keep the prices of food stable and prevent spikes.
Producing less biofuel allows for sugar, maize and other food crops to be used as food, thus increasing the amount of food available to the global population and reduces the price on those items allowing for more people to access them.
However, those solutions mentioned above are short term and also hard to regulate. The most surefire way to end global hunger is to increase education. Less than 1 percent of what every nation in the world spends on developing weapons could put every child in the world in school.
An increase of education does not just help to put food in the stomach of one person, but also helps to increase the economy of the town or city the educated person is living in.
An educated person from an underdeveloped town would then have the means to open their own business and then employ others in their town who could then use their pay to invest in furthering their own education.
Education also provides children access to a stable food source and is a “strong incentive to send children to school and keep them there.” By sending children to school, it also allows families in underdeveloped countries to increase their food security in times of famine.
– Monica Newell
Sources: The Guardian, Do Something, Millions of Mouths, Huff Post, WFP
Photo: Jewels Fab Life