( Published in The Counter May 5, 2008 )
According to the international organization Action Against Hunger, a food crisis that emerges from the large increase in the price of basic foods, raw way affect cruel and more than 850 million people, mainly in Africa, Asia and the Caribbean, who are hungry in the midst of plenty and waste resource that allows the highly developed world. Moreover, the World Bank itself, through its current president, Robert Zoellick, called for a coordinated global action to counter the effects of food crisis, since the increase in food prices is causing food shortages, hunger and malnutrition around the world. According to the World Bank are 33 countries in the world who face the possibility of a social and political crisis due to high food prices and energy.
The situation is critical and has not received, as expected, the news coverage that a problem of this magnitude require. The situation is so acute that from the World Food Program (WFP) warns that food reserves in the world are at the lowest level of the last 30 years and threatens 100 million people who are "the poorest of the poor "and that also affect the ability to respond to rising energy prices and fertilizer over 500 million rural poor. Some international analysts say could simply be the price of rice rising by 52% in two months and cereals by 84% in four months against a backdrop of rising oil prices, to precipitate a two billion of people to the poverty threshold. This has led to the secretary general of UN, Ban Ki-Moon, to argue that he feared a "cascading crises" that affect the growth and security of the world if the crisis of food prices "is not maintained in a right and urgent. "
probably not easy to clearly understand a situation like this, but the numbers are so clear and obvious that it is not necessary to be an expert in the field to look out the seriousness of the problem. Approximately 50% of humanity lives on less than two dollars a day and nearly a billion on less than a dollar a day. We're talking about an astronomical figure of people in very precarious conditions, about three and a half billion people-who live in poor countries and that, on average, spend 75% of its budget on food, while in rich countries this type of expenditure does not exceed 15%. So if we know that in poor countries, wheat, soybeans, rice and maize are the foundation of your diet and you also know that in the past 12 months, the price of wheat rose 130%, soy 85 % and maize 35%, while the rice is made by 71%, we will not be surprising that today the world faces a serious food crisis. The price of rice in a few months spent $ 300 a ton to $ 1,200. The World Food Program (WFP) evaluated in a 55% increase in food prices since June 2007 and some experts estimate that this figure reaches 70%.
These figures, however hard and cold look like, we can explain the outbursts of violence that have occurred throughout the planet, especially with 5 dead in Haiti, Egypt, Ivory Coast, Cameroon with 40 dead, Mauritania , Mozambique, Senegal, Uzbekistan and Yemen. In Haiti, the crisis brought down Prime Minister Jacques Edouard Alexis, who was ousted by the Haitian Senate in a dramatic attempt to stop the violent protests of the population with many facilities were looted, burned and destroyed due to the increase in food prices. An example that illustrates the delicate situation is what happens in El Salvador, where according to the World Food Program, rural communities are buying 50% less food than 18 months, which means that their nutritional intake is already poor, has been cut in half. The situation is more complicated because it is reaching the highly developed countries, whose people are now investing 5% of their income on food purchases. United States, the world's largest consumer, is experiencing the worst hike in food prices in nearly two decades, including some large retail chains like Wal-Mart and Cotsco have rationed the sale of certain products like rice. To make matters worse, the United Nations warned that the rising price of staples may continue until 2010.
So, in the Philippines, Pakistan and Thailand as hosts monitored to prevent theft and looting in grain storage facilities and Thailand, the Army stands guard in the fields of rice, while Vietnam has been increasingly strikes more frequent food shortages. Indonesia, third largest producer of rice, announced that only allow exports if reserves exceed three million tons and Kazakhstan suspended all wheat exports until September 1. For its part, Argentina, Vietnam and Russia have also restricted exports of wheat, rice and soybeans to meet the domestic market.
Among the causes of the current food crisis, the British medical journal Lancet, noted the effects of climate change, agricultural subsidies and, above all, the massive use of food products to produce the so-called biofuels. Indeed, the adverse conditions of climate change, among which include flash floods or prolonged droughts, prevent an increase in the production of cereals and grains, while the demand caused by global population growth does not stop. Moreover, the growing demand countries such as China and India for quality food, has an impact not less than the increase in demand for grains, for example in China, per capita demand for meat from 20 to 50 kilos per year, which greatly impacts the cereal requirements as to increase production of meat, you need to increase the consumption of these products by livestock. In turn, the need to reduce dependence on oil has led to the reassignment of important food products to the production of so-called biofuels, currently being used about 100 million tons of grain per year to make ethanol or biodiesel.
Certainly the issue of biofuels is highly controversial, since in some cases, when it comes to the use of grains such as corn and wheat are the power base of billions of people-usually the poorest, is a real contradiction of ethics and, as production of salmon that destroys a natural fish biomass almost ten times the size of salmon production, should be promoted worldwide moratorium that prevented the use of critical resources such as fish biomass and grain reserves to sustain the lucrative business salmon and multinationals such as Monsanto which, worldwide impact and so gravitated in the production and disposition of grains like corn. Not remembering that with current oil prices, the incentive to reallocate the grains to the production of these biofuels grows in direct proportion to the increase in oil prices. In this regard, consider that a barrel of OPEC crude has hit the $ 111, the Brent North is the reference in Europe, and traded in London at $ 117, and Texas, the U.S. benchmark, reached in New York $ 120. Indeed, multinational companies like Monsanto, responsible for terrible Agent Orange and the proliferation of PCB's and dioxin in the world will not have ethical troubles when threatening than 850 million hungry people in the world if a lot of money involved. The problem that biofuels are causing was even highlighted by the British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who considers it necessary to remedy the recent rise in food prices and the international community should consider the impact it is having on this issue the production of biofuels.
No less important in explaining the current food crisis is the agricultural policy followed by the highly developed countries. The chairman of the IMF, Dominique Strauss, displaying the ideological bias of the organization, said that the sudden crisis food, which has increased more in countries of Asia, Africa and the Caribbean, is due to trade policies and subsidies that rich countries give their farmers. Although it is put into question the IMF's ideological obsession that seeks to demolish any form of taxes and subsidies, it should not segarnos to the enormous impact it can have on the world economy, especially in poor countries, more than 300 billion dollars annually spent by rich countries (EU, Japan, South Korea, the U.S. and Canada) to subsidize their agricultural producers. This represents approximately 30% of production value and in these circumstances business no stamina. This will not do or can do in developing countries is rightfully unfair competition affecting the poorest of the poor of the world, which is further aggravated when many times, the so-called development aid is to deliver supplies these foodstuffs to poor countries, helping to remove and destroy the traditional production of these peoples. Many times the development aid is used as an excuse for grants to support policies that make rich countries to their farmers. The political hypocrisy is not unique to the Third World.
Not a few experts argue that food aid policies of rich countries, where production is subsidized-changed in the last six decades the eating habits and destroyed the local agricultural production of villages in Africa and the Caribbean. Vandana Shiva-recognized leader of the Third World, blamed the World Bank and IMF for the destruction of traditional farming systems of poor countries, thanks to development projects and structural adjustment policies, were forced to cease production of grains, to rely on exports of flowers, exotic fruits and vegetables, as well as biofuels. All these products are destined for markets in industrialized countries are who hoard the wealth of the world. African and Caribbean stopped eating tubers such as cassava or sweet potatoes and other roots that were produced locally and formed the basis for food before they were introduced, as development aid, wheat, rice and maize. In Haiti, the U.S. imported rice at subsidized prices replaced the tubers, roots and local production, and in some African countries, it is cheaper to import grain and onions from France to be produced locally, which contributes to dependency and the inability of poor countries to develop its food industry.
This critical situation facing the world has been ratified on April 15 in Johannesburg, South Africa, at a meeting of governments and scientists in the world, sponsored by the UN and the World Bank where he unveiled the report of the ASSESSMENT PANEL OF INTERNATIONAL KNOWLEDGE, SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY IN THE AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT (IAASTD), which demands a radical change in the form of agricultural production. In that report, forecast the serious conflicts that involve the current food shortages and dramatic, we question the green revolution based on the intensive use of pesticides and fertilizers, and genetically modified organisms and emphasizes the need to promote and strengthen small-scale agriculture as the only viable solution to the crisis. IAASTD director Robert Watson, said: "Business as Usual is Not an option," saying that the way the world currently facing food shortages, will not solve the problem of hunger, or poverty or the environmental crisis experienced by the planet. The report, conducted by a group of 400 researchers worldwide, was adopted by 55 countries and only the U.S., Canada and Australia expressed reservations, while some OECD countries rejected the question of agricultural subsidies.
The problem is posed and appeared as a pest and is a long latent expected to politicians in the world, are able to take this challenge on the scale and size as appropriate.
Marcel Claude, an economist.
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