Poverty and Hunger

[Kadark]

No he's not. We have welfare, food stamps, not to mention all the various agencies you cited in your post. Most "poor" people are overweight!

Can you cite a single case of someone (who's not insane) starving in the US?

Regardless, capitalism and freedom are the cure for poverty. Socialism, communism, and every other form of statism is the cause.

I kind of agree. To starve in a country like the United States (or Canada, since I live here), you have to be extraordinarily stupid or lazy. People worldwide flock here to take advantage of the ample opportunities, so to lack the ability to feed yourself is very embarrassing indeed.

 

[S.A.M.]

No he's not. We have welfare, food stamps, not to mention all the various agencies you cited in your post. Most "poor" people are overweight!

Can you cite a single case of someone (who's not insane) starving in the US?

Regardless, capitalism and freedom are the cure for poverty. Socialism, communism, and every other form of statism is the cause.

So I guess it is true after all, Americans think poor people deserve their poverty due to laziness and stupidity.

Amazing.

http://www.hungerinamerica.org/

 

[Kadark]

Does a link to a homepage really prove anything?

 

[madanthonywayne]

So I guess it is true after all, Americans think poor people deserve their poverty due to laziness and stupidity.

Amazing.

Perhaps you should put your own house in order before casting aspersions on the US.

India is one among 17 countries where the number of the undernourished increased substantially in the second half of the 1990s. Tracking the incidence of hunger in India over three reference periods - 1990-92, 1995-97 and 1999-2001 - the FAO plots an initial decline from 214.5 million to 194.7 million, before a near total reversal of all gains pushed up the number of the undernourished to 213.7 million.

Guess what? Eating too much is now considered a form of malnutrition! So that should help pump up US numbers!

 

[Oniw17]

So I guess it is true after all, Americans think poor people deserve their poverty due to laziness and stupidity.

Amazing.

http://www.hungerinamerica.org/

We do have welfare and public housing.

 

[lucifers angel]

What do YOU think are the causes of poverty and hunger in a world as replete and as small as ours is today?

i dont know about hunger, but some poverty can be found in poorer areas of america where they ferry people on a bus to work for they're welfare cheques and most of the time have not enough money to pay they're rent, and then the businesses getting a tax relief on them because they are doing the goverment a favour, when will people realise that if the jobs are there for people to do, wouldnt it be better for them to have the jobs on a full time basis and get paid a decent liveable wage?

 

[Atom]

First and foremost one must look at how the 'civilizations'/cities developed...and whether the industrial revolution was possible among an essentially nomadic/tribal peoples.

The commonly held view in prosperous nation such as the USA and West Europe is that their failure to develop is the fault of themselves and themselves alone. Principally by pointing towards the 'Industrial revolution' as a prerequsitie to building the infrastructure for a modern society. Oddly enough I was born at what is generally considered the cradle of the INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION....in fact, it could be the THE CLOCK THAT DOSTH STRIKETH 13 TIMES augered its very beginning

Is it a case of Education?

Well general education in Ethiopia is six years of primary school, four years of lower secondary school and two years of higher secondary school accoding to Wikipedia. Some would argue that they should think for themselves and get sort ut their own Affairs.

Many Westerners argue when asked to give Aid why they should bother when most of it ends up in the pockets of corrupt Leaders in undeveloped countries rather than being of any benefit to them. Society shows us that doling out Benefits merely leads to laziness of thought and dependence on handouts rather than Independence and self sufficiency (which explainswhy I am a Liberal Tory voter of the Heseltine/Cameron hue rather than socialist).

Despite vast amounts of money...most of it seems to be squandered..

http://allafrica.com/stories/200709050320.html

Africa never developed anything we would recognise as agriculture. this did not matter when populations were kept small by disease and endemic warfare. Colonisation brought peace, medicine and hygiene . And populations grew. With decolonisation came gross maladministration, theft, corruption and hunger. The last was kept at bay because there were food suplusses in eg the US. And that these could conveniently disposed of to the WFP.

Fatuous notions of 'saving' Africa by giving access for non-existant industrial and agricultire products are merely the empty gestures of self important Pop stars and guilt ridden sops and blandishments made by liberal politicians and champagne socialists.

In Northern Europe the people had to work hard just to survive and when times were good they carried on working hard (as it was habitual) and this helped them grow.

It's as simple as that.

Islam also had a civilization but did not make it into the 20th Century. Neither did China or India but that may be due to different causes/explanations... Japan is an example of a country that did.

 

[S.A.M.]

Billy there were 25 famines in India during British colonisation, none before or since, and attributed to the British practice of sending food in excess to their troops while locals starved.

So are we to believe that colonisation of Africa was good for them?

You do know that the US dumping their food in the third world causes local farmers to go bankrupt?

 

[Sock puppet path]

Billy there were 25 famines in India during British colonisation, none before or since, and attributed to the British practice of sending food in excess to their troops while locals starved.

Not true
before

650: Famine throughout India
1022,1033: Great famines, entire provinces were depopulated
1344-1345: Great famine
1396-1407: The Durga Devi famine
1630-1631: there was a famine in Ahmedabad, Gujarat.
1630-1632: Deccan famine in India kills 2 million (Note: There was a corresponding famine in northwestern China, eventually causing the Ming dynasty to collapse in 1644.)
1661: famine, when not a drop of rain fell for two years
1702-1704: 2 million died of famine in Deccan

and after

In 1966, there was a 'near miss' in Bihar. The USA allocated 900,000 tons of grain to fight the famine. A further 'near miss' food crisis occurred due to drought in Maharashtra in 1970-1973.
1974-1975: A famine in Bangladesh, formerly part of India and the area primarily affected by the above Bengal famines, caused more than 1 million deaths. (Dyson 1991, 7)

linkage

 

[S.A.M.]

I meant man made famine, not just in times of natural disasters, but I should have clarified that.

An interesting article on the whitewashing of history
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/science/ockham/stories/s19040.htm

Citing the Bengal Famine and other examples from the world, Amartya Sen argues that famines do not occur in functioning democracies. Nobel Laureate Kenneth Arrow provides a discussion of this argument [1]

The Bengal Famine may be placed in the context of previous famines in British India. During the British rule in India there were approximately 25 major famines spread through states such as Tamil Nadu in South India, Bihar in the north, and Bengal in the east; altogether, between 30 and 40 million Indians were the victims of famines in the latter half of the 19th century (Bhatia 1985).

Though malnutrition and hunger remain widespread in India, there have been no famines since the end of the British rule in 1947 and the establishment of a democratic government. There has been a recurrent threat of famine in Bangladesh[2][3], which unlike India has spent a considerable period of its existence under military rule.

The increase in the food available to the population is also reflected in the fact that in 50 years of British rule (1891 to 1941) the population grew by 35% (from 287 million to 389 million) whereas in the 50 years of democratic rule from 1951 to 2001 the population grew by 183% (from 363 million to 1,023 million) [4]. During this period there have been no famines, though the population has almost tripled. It should be noted that between 1950 and 1984, as the Green Revolution transformed agriculture around the globe, world grain production increased by 250%.[5]

[edit]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bengal_famine_of_1943

Besides, all the famine currently in the third world is artificially induced.

1. diverting land to cash crops

Dr Judith MacKay, Director of the Asian Consultancy on Tobacco Control in Hong Kong, claims that tobacco’s “minor” use of land denies 10 to 20 million people of food. “Where food has to be imported because rich farmland is being diverted to tobacco production, the government will have to bear the cost of food imports,” she points out.

… The bottom line for governments of developing countries is that the net economic costs of tobacco are profoundly negative — the cost of treatment, disability and death exceeds the economic benefits to producers by at least US$200 billion annually “with one third of this loss being incurred by developing countries”.

— John Madeley, Big Business Poor Peoples; The Impact of Transnational Corporations on the World’s Poor, (Zed Books, 1999) pp. 53, 57

2. Emphasis on food as commodity

[Farmers] producing [fruit and vegetables] for export markets has recently become more common. TNCs are increasingly involved in the production of crops that have traditionally not been exported. But export crops are replacing staple foods in some areas, resulting in food scarcities and rising food prices that hit hard at the poorest.

… Yet [the market success seen by this exporting policy] “has frequently come at a cost in workers' health, inequitable distribution of economic benefits, and environmental degradation in many of the exporting countries.”

… Small-scale farmers and consumers in Latin America are paying the price of this drastic shift to export agriculture. In towns and cities across the continent, beans are now frequently scarce as land which once grew beans now grows vegetables for export. Beans contribute around 30 per cent of the protein consumption by the continent’s 200 million low-income families. Most bean farmers are now trying to grow vegetables for export and devoting less of their land (often already small) to beans for their own use.

— John Madeley, Big Business Poor Peoples; The Impact of Transnational Corporations on the World’s Poor, (Zed Books, 1999) pp. 64 - 66

3. structural adjustment and trade policies

World hunger exists because: (1) colonialism, and later subtle monopoly capitalism, dispossessed hundreds of millions of people from their land; the current owners are the new plantation managers producing for the mother countries; (2) the low-paid undeveloped countries sell to the highly paid developed countries because there is no local market [because the low-paid people do not have enough to pay] … and (3) the current Third World land owners, producing for the First World, are appendages to the industrialized world, stripping all natural wealth from the land to produce food, lumber, and other products for wealthy nations.

This system is largely kept in place by underpaying the defeated colonial societies for the real value of their labor and resources, leaving them no choice but to continue to sell their natural wealth to the over-paid industrial societies that overwhelmed them. To eliminate hunger: (1) the dispossessed, weak, individualized people must be protected from the organized and legally protected multinational corporations; (2) there must be managed trade to protect both the Third World and the developed world, so the dispossessed can reclaim use of their land; (3) the currently defeated people can then produce the more labor-intensive, high-protein/high-calorie crops that contain all eight (or nine) essential amino acids; and (4) those societies must adapt dietary patterns so that vegetables, grains, and fruits are consumed in the proper amino acid combinations, with small amounts of meat or fish for flavor. With similar dietary adjustments among the wealthy, there would be enough food for everyone.

— J.W. Smith, The World’s Wasted Wealth 2, Institute for Economic Democracy, 1994), pp. 63, 64.

http://www.globalissues.org/

 

[S.A.M.]

The "food as commodity" argument creates an interesting economic equation:

To understand why people go hungry you must stop thinking about food as something farmers grow for others to eat, and begin thinking about it as something companies produce for other people to buy.

* Food is a commodity.…
* Much of the best agricultural land in the world is used to grow commodities such as cotton, sisal, tea, tobacco, sugar cane, and cocoa, items which are non-food products or are marginally nutritious, but for which there is a large market.
* Millions of acres of potentially productive farmland is used to pasture cattle, an extremely inefficient use of land, water and energy, but one for which there is a market in wealthy countries.
* More than half the grain grown in the United States (requiring half the water used in the U.S.) is fed to livestock, grain that would feed far more people than would the livestock to which it is fed.…

The problem, of course, is that people who don’t have enough money to buy food (and more than one billion people earn less than $1.00 a day), simply don’t count in the food equation.

* In other words, if you don’t have the money to buy food, no one is going to grow it for you.
* Put yet another way, you would not expect The Gap to manufacture clothes, Adidas to manufacture sneakers, or IBM to provide computers for those people earning $1.00 a day or less; likewise, you would not expect ADM (“Supermarket to the World”) to produce food for them.

What this means is that ending hunger requires doing away with poverty, or, at the very least, ensuring that people have enough money or the means to acquire it, to buy, and hence create a market demand for food.

— Richard H. Robbins, Readings on Poverty, Hunger, and Economic Development

 

[Sock puppet path]

I don't see 25 famines there, From the link it seems that except in 1770 and 1876 the british tried to lessen the impact of famine where they could. :shrug:

The British record on famines in India is a mixed one. The first major famine that took place under British rule was the Bengal Famine of 1770. About a quarter to a third of the population of Bengal starved to death in about a ten month period. East India Company's raising of taxes disastrously coincided with this famine [3] and exacerbated it even if the famine was not caused by the British regime [4].

Following this famine ‘’Successive British governments were anxious not to add to the burden of taxation” [5].

In 1866 the rains failed again in Bengal and Orissa. Food was rushed into the famine stricken zones. The result of which was that the famine was alleviated in Bengal although a Monsoon in Orissa forced the closure of the harbour. As a result food could not be imported into Orissa as easily as Bengal [6]

In 1874 the response from the British authorities was better. Famine was completely averted.

Then in 1876 a huge famine broke out in Madras. Lord Lytton's administration believed that 'market forces alone would suffice to feed the starving Indians' [7]. Beatty Balfour wrote in her book, Lord Lytton's Indian Administration that:


In the despatch addressed to the Duke of Buckingham, in which the Viceroy announced his intention of visiting the famine districts of Madras and Mysores, the general principles for the management of famine affairs were once more laid down. After stating that the Government of India, with approval of Her Majesty’s Government, were resolved to avert death by starvation by the employment of all means available, the Viceroy first expressed his conviction that ‘absolute non-interference with the operations of private commercial enterprise must be the foundation of their present famine policy.’ This on the ground that ‘free and abundant trade cannot co-exist with Government importation’ and that more food will reach the famine stricken districts if private enterprise is left to itself (beyond receiving every possible facility and information from the government) than if it were paralysed by Government competition.[8]




The results of such thinking proved fatal (some 5.5 million starved [9]) and so such a policy was abandoned. Lord Lytton established the Famine Insurance Grant, a system in which, in times of financial surplus, Rs. 1,500,000 would be applied to famine relief works. The results of this were that the British prematurely assumed that the problem of famine had been solved forever which made future British viceroy's complacent (which proved disastrous in 1896) [10]. Lord Curzon tried to alliveate the famine, he spent Rs. 68,000,000 (about £10,000,000) to try and reduce the effects of the famine [11] and, at its peak, 4.5 million people were on famine relief. The number of people who died during the famine of 1896-1902 was 4.5 million [12].

 

[S.A.M.]

I don't see 25 famines there, From the link it seems that except in 1770 and 1876 the british tried to lessen the impact of famine where they could. :shrug:

There is literature out there, Bhatia and Sen have done a lot of work on it.

There were 14 famines in India between 11th and 17th century (Bhatia, 1985). For example, during the 1022-1033 Great famines in India entire provinces were depopulated. Famine in Deccan killed at least 2 million people in 1702-1704. B.M. Bhatia believes that the earlier famines were localised, and it was only after 1860, during the British rule, that famine came to signify general shortage of foodgrains in the country. There were approximately 25 major famines spread through states such as Tamil Nadu in the south, and Bihar and Bengal in the east during the latter half of the 19th century, killing between 30 and 40 million Indians.

Romesh Dutt argued as early as 1900, and present-day scholars such as Amartya Sen agree, that the famines were a product of both uneven rainfall and British economic and administrative policies, which since 1857 had led to the seizure and conversion of local farmland to foreign-owned plantations, restrictions on internal trade, heavy taxation of Indian citizens to support unsuccessful British expeditions in Afghanistan (see The Second Anglo-Afghan War), inflationary measures that increased the price of food, and substantial exports of staple crops from India to Britain. (Dutt, 1900 and 1902; Srivastava, 1968; Sen, 1982; Bhatia, 1985.) Some British citizens, such as William Digby, agitated for policy reforms and famine relief, but Lord Lytton, the governing British viceroy in India, opposed such changes in the belief that they would stimulate shirking by Indian workers. The first, the Bengal famine of 1770, is estimated to have taken around 10 million lives — nearly one-third of Bengal's population at the time. The famines continued until independence in 1947, with the Bengal Famine of 1943–44—among the most devastating—killing 3 million to 4 million Indians during World War II.

The observations of the Famine Commission of 1880 support the notion that food distribution is more to blame for famines than food scarcity. They observed that each province in British India, including Burma, had a surplus of foodgrains, and the annual surplus was 5.16 million tons (Bhatia, 1970). At that time, annual export of rice and other grains from India was approximately one million tons.

 

[Challenger78]

There cannot be a single cause for poverty and hunger..

A lot of the worlds current poor states can be traced to colonial exploitation and the constant exploitation by western companies. A part of which is also about individual greed and the desire for power. .
Another part of which is because of our unwillingness (to which all of us are guilty) to do anything to harm our lifestyle (we in the western countries) have gotten used too.

Until we don't put the deaths and needs of the many over the needs of the few, we will continue to have poverty and hunger.

 

[Atom]

There's too far too much were 'tribal' infighting pure and simple for any real development, things like the caste system got in the way until the British arrived.

And also one has to take into account the climatic conditions...Inuits and eskimo's aren't known for developing huge amounts of money. They're basically happy with what they've got.

 

[S.A.M.]

There's too far too much were 'tribal' infighting pure and simple for any real development, things like the caste system got in the way until the British arrived.

And also one has to take into account the climatic conditions...Inuits and eskimo's aren't known for developing huge amounts of money. They're basically happy with what they've got.

Huh? Where do you get that? From Mills, who wrote the History of India without ever visiting it?

 

[madanthonywayne]

The "food as commodity" argument creates an interesting economic equation

So you don't think food is a commodity? Then what is? The alternative to treating food as a commodity is collectivism which has a very poor record of providing for the needs of the people.

As your own link suggests, the cure for hunger is to increase the wealth of poor nations. That is done thru good government. That is to say, government that does not interfer with the economy or hoard wealth for the benefit of the ruler.

 

[Grantywanty]

So you don't think food is a commodity? Then what is? The alternative to treating food as a commodity is collectivism which has a very poor record of providing for the needs of the people.

Only after tribal groups came in contact with - what a euphemism - capitalistic societies. Collective feeding worked quite well. And it was consciously broken up in many colonies, not becuase it didn't work, but because commonly held land could not be bought and sold. Money making was the issue, not inefficiency. And what happened during the transition from communally held land to privately held land was very ugly for nearly every group that had lived communally. It sure as shit didn't help them.

 

[Atom]

Huh? Where do you get that? From Mills, who wrote the History of India without ever visiting it?

Which of the Mills Brothers are you referring to. I am taking my source from Prof. Freddy Mills.


India witnessed interminable excruciating bloodshed, mass killings and civil war at the eve of independence, which overshadowed the festivity and euphoria of independence. Many Indians view the days of the Raj with reverence. Indian society Has divided into numerous classes, castes and religions and without British help it wouldn't have the essential infrastructure to have survived. Everything from the Judicial System to Railways was brought to India by the British Raj.

 

[Atom]

There is literature out there, Bhatia and Sen have done a lot of work on it.

Sock Puppet sounds familiar..

Comparisons made pre-1947 between the development of economies in many parts of the world and post WW2 have to take into account the technological advances, cold war etc which made for the movement of aid either from the US or the USSR...

However a quick 'google' come with the following 'quote':

(a) There were 14 famines in India between 11th and 17th century (Bhatia, 1985). ...

(b) Famines didn't happen under Nehru: "deficits" did.