I'm heartened by the general response to my anger. But it's not like there are millions of us. Yet. There need to be millions. If you don't already know why I'm FURIOUS, read
this. (It's short.)
Today I'm going to treat you to a compilation of internet news articles on the current effects of hunger and associated poverty. It will be painful to read- but it will give you ammunition.
From CNN: Food aid to Darfur has been cut. "Ahead of the rainy season, which lasts from May into September, WFP trucks should be delivering 1,800 metric tons (1,984 short tons) of food to warehouses in Darfur, WFP said. However, deliveries have dropped to fewer than 900 metric tons (992 short tons) per day, it said.
Since January, 60 WFP-contracted trucks have been hijacked in Darfur, the agency said. More than half -- 39 -- are still missing, and 26 drivers are unaccounted for. One driver was killed in Darfur last month, WFP said."
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From the Washington Post:
US financial debacle hits Mexico: "the downturn in the U.S. economy has cascaded into Mexico, causing a sudden, precipitous drop in the flow of money sent home by Mexican immigrants"
"Economists here believe the decline in remittances is already pushing thousands into extreme poverty and could lead to a significant increase in migration as desperate Mexicans, deprived of support from abroad, flee to an ever more difficult U.S. job market."
"Hernández, 80, doesn't take his diabetes medicine anymore. It costs too much, and he'd rather buy food than pills. Ever since his son, Alfonso, lost his home in the United States to foreclosure a few months ago and stopped sending money for medicine and farm supplies, life has been "a disaster, a total disaster," Hernández said."
"The sons of at least three of Hernández's elderly neighbors have also lost their homes, their jobs or both, he said. The river of money from the United States that sustained this village is now drier than the desert that surrounds it."
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From The New York Times:
Hunger Brings Anger: Just read this whole article; it's not that long. "Saint Louis Meriska’s children ate two spoonfuls of rice apiece as their only meal recently and then went without any food the following day. His eyes downcast, his own stomach empty, the unemployed father said forlornly, “They look at me and say, ‘Papa, I’m hungry,’ and I have to look away. It’s humiliating and it makes you angry.”
That anger is palpable across the globe. The food crisis is not only being felt among the poor but is also eroding the gains of the working and middle classes, sowing volatile levels of discontent and putting new pressures on fragile governments."
"Last month in Senegal, one of Africa’s oldest and most stable democracies, police in riot gear beat and used tear gas against people protesting high food prices and later raided a television station that broadcast images of the event. Many Senegalese have expressed anger at President Abdoulaye Wade for spending lavishly on roads and five-star hotels for an Islamic summit meeting last month while many people are unable to afford rice or fish."
"Down Cairo’s Hafziyah Street, peddlers selling food from behind wood carts bark out their prices. But few customers can afford their fish or chicken, which bake in the hot sun. Food prices have doubled in two months."
"In Haiti, where three-quarters of the population earns less than $2 a day and one in five children is chronically malnourished, the one business booming amid all the gloom is the selling of patties made of mud, oil and sugar, typically consumed only by the most destitute.
“It’s salty and it has butter and you don’t know you’re eating dirt,” said Olwich Louis Jeune, 24, who has taken to eating them more often in recent months. “It makes your stomach quiet down.”
"In the sprawling slum of Haiti’s Cité Soleil, Placide Simone, 29, offered one of her five offspring to a stranger. “Take one,” she said, cradling a listless baby and motioning toward four rail-thin toddlers, none of whom had eaten that day. “You pick. Just feed them.” "
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A critically important bit of that NYT article is here: " the spike in commodity prices — the biggest since the Nixon administration — has pitted the globe’s poorer south against the relatively wealthy north, adding to demands for reform of rich nations’ farm and environmental policies. But experts say there are few quick fixes to a crisis tied to so many factors, from strong demand for food from emerging economies like China’s to rising oil prices to the diversion of food resources to make biofuels.
There are no scripts on how to handle the crisis, either. In Asia, governments are putting in place measures to limit hoarding of rice after some shoppers panicked at price increases and bought up everything they could."
Notice? THERE IS NO MENTION OF FOOD SPECULATION AS A CAUSE- OR STOPPING IT AS A REMEDY.
We need to get speculation into the public eye and mind- and get it talked about. That's step one.
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"The Deniliquin mill, the largest rice mill in the Southern Hemisphere, once processed enough grain to meet the needs of 20 million people around the world. But six long years of drought have taken a toll, reducing Australia’s rice crop by 98 percent and leading to the mothballing of the mill last December."
"The collapse of Australia’s rice production is one of several factors contributing to a doubling of rice prices in the last three months — increases that have led the world’s largest exporters to restrict exports severely, spurred panicked hoarding in Hong Kong and the Philippines, and set off violent protests in countries including Cameroon, Egypt, Ethiopia, Haiti, Indonesia, Italy, Ivory Coast, Mauritania, the Philippines, Thailand, Uzbekistan and Yemen."
"Drought has already spurred significant changes in Australia’s agricultural heartland. Some farmers are abandoning rice, which requires large amounts of water, to plant less water-intensive crops like wheat or, especially here in southeastern Australia, wine grapes. Other rice farmers have sold fields or water rights, usually to grape growers."
"Scientists expect the problem to worsen. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, set up by the United Nations, predicted last year that even slight warming would lower agricultural output in the tropics and subtropics."
"Australia’s total rice capacity has declined by about a third because many farmers have permanently sold water rights, mostly for grape production. And production last year was far lower because of a severe shortage of water; rice farmers received one-eighth of the water they are usually promised by the government."
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Also from The New York Times- Business section:
Organic Food Too Pricey?: "people who have to buy organic grain, from bakers and pasta makers to chicken and dairy farmers, say they are struggling to maintain profit margins, even though shoppers are paying more. The price of organic animal feed is so high that some dairy farmers have abandoned organic farming methods"
"Perry Abbenante, global grocery coordinator for Whole Foods Market, said sales were strong and customer counts were up. He said it might be too soon to know how consumers would react to higher organic prices, particularly in dairy. “Man, $6.99 for a gallon of milk is pushing it,” he said. “We have to be very careful about not pricing organics out of the market.” "
"prices for conventional corn, soybeans and wheat are at or near records, so there is less incentive for farmers to switch to organic crops; making the switch requires a three-year transition and piles of paperwork."
"Bob Eberly, president of Eberly Poultry in Stevens, Pa. The cost of raising poultry has increased 16 percent in the last six months, but he said his prices had increased only 7 percent."
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Ok. Gonna quit with the terrifying quotes here, before (hopefully before!!) I drive any readers into horrified catatonia. That's NOT the idea.
One point about the business aspects of organic- eventually, the rising costs of fuel SHOULD make the competitive aspects of organic/non-organic tip in favor of ORGANIC. Commercial fertilizer is made mostly from natural gas. Then shipped - it's heavy, and takes a lot of diesel to move. And spread. Most organic farmers use only on-farm inputs; manure or green manure. That's going to turn out to be a HUGE benefit, very soon. Likewise- pesticides- can only get much more expensive.
This is
already happening- acres planted to corn in the US will be DOWN 8% from last year. Multiple causes- one of them being- the very high cost of fertilizer, which corn uses like a drunk on his last binge goes through Sterno.
My own guess about the organic industry is- it's going to be painful for a while- but reality will eventually kick in, and the day may well come when organic food is CHEAPER than "conventional". Assuming the
arctic methane doesn't get us first. :-)
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So. For the first time, I'm going to ask the readers of this blog to DO something. For us all.
Many of the causes of the world food crisis are beyond our immediate reach; we can't fix global warming this morning.
But one cause is NOT beyond reach. It's HUGE- and virtually UNRECOGNIZED.
It's Food "
Investment" - otherwise known as- SPECULATION.
The politically engaged population of the US - and the WORLD - does not know it's there; and do not know that potentially- it could be OUTLAWED. Next week.
It could. Life-critical resources have always been protected from speculation (theoretically!) - it's an absolute obscenity to sell water to people dying of thirst- the whole species feels that way.
That's the anger we need to stir; and this post has been written as an introduction to the situation.
The starving countries SHOULD start the push- if we can alert the Philippines that half of the price of rice goes into the pockets of slimy weasel food profiteers- they can start screaming to the world- the UN, the World Court, the World Trade Association - that this MUST STOP.
The Philippines - Malaysia - Thailand - could actually pass legislation internally banning food speculation. And then start boycotting international companies that facilitiate it.
Of course it won't be easy to write the laws. Of course the profiteers will scream bloody murder. But yes, it can be done.
They will pass laws long before the US will. Europe will pass laws, long before the US will. But eventually the moral pressure will be huge.
In fact, at the moment, the ultra-rich in this country are just smugly grinning about how cool they are- outsmarting the markets. Most of them have, pardon my Serbian, "
shit eating grins" glued on. (I think he's saying "yeah, sit on THIS, peon!" But at least he's wearing his flag pin!)
But they ARE human. If they continually wake up in the morning and have to read stories about how the rest of the world truly considers them to be lower than pond-scum- they will get depressed. As people. And start yielding. Even pond-scum would LIKE to think they're "good people"- at least most of them; some of the time.
So: PLEASE DO THIS:
Do you have a blog? Link to this post. Write about it. Spread it to other blogs. Tell them to read the previous several posts here, too.
In 15 minutes: Email this post to 10 of your contacts who may think as you do. Ask them to pass it on.
Email this post to your legislators; if you know some, personally, send it personally, and ask to talk to them about launching legislation.
Do you have friends in hungry countries? Email them this post- ask them to pass it on. Get them to put it in the hands of their government.
Get this post to your pastor, rabbi, or imam- ask them to turn it into a sermon- and get your congregation RILED.
Do you have contacts in universities? Get this post to activist groups on campuses- get them to work on... DEMONSTRATIONS. There should be THOUSANDS marching down Wall Street, with banners saying-
"MURDERERS!!"
- and photos of the starving. What the hell- have friends in Haiti? Ask them to FedEx you a few corpses. They're cheap and don't weigh much. Prop them up on the Stock Exchange steps.
Are you a member of a conservation group? Get them this post.
Pass it on. Talk about it. GET ANGRY- just in case you're not. Send your comments here about what you've done- and ideas of your own. Let's get it moving.
(so far today a LOT of people have "hit" here; nearly a thousand so far- but only a few have commented. I KNOW more of us have sent an email or two- please DO send me a comment, just to say- "I posted it: or I emailed it." A movement needs people!)
Just take 15 minutes, please.
Think this kind of action can't work? Take a look
here- substantive change, happening right now, LONG before the laws change.
more to come.
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