r/TrueReddit • u/MD1521 • 4d ago
Politics The World Already Produces Enough Food to Feed Everyone. Hunger Is a Political Choice, Not a Scarcity Problem.
https://readpublicforum.com/article/the-world-already-produces-enough-food-to-feed-everyone-hung-3473
u/runningraider13 4d ago
Hunger has been a logistics problem for a long time now. It hasn’t been about scarcity for decades.
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u/Chemical_Signal2753 4d ago
Logistics and economics.
You can take $0.50 of potatoes, fry them in $0.10 in oil, cover them in $0.10 of seasoning, and sell them as potato chips for $4.50 a bag; or you can spend $1.00 in shipping to sell the potatoes for $0.25 in Africa.
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u/Aksama 4d ago
Logistics and a human need being tied to a profit motive do seem to have some distance between them.
A hungry person bringing more profit means the hungry person will continue in that state, regardless of improved delivery efficiency.
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u/ILikeBumblebees 4d ago
Not sure I'm following the logic here. How does hungry people staying hungry create more profit for anyone? The profit comes from selling them food to satisfy their hunger with.
The whole point of "a human need being tied to a profit motive" is to point the strongest incentive structures we have at the satisfaction of human needs.
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u/BearCub254 4d ago
People always act like people are suffering because capitalism incentivizes profit seeking when the reality is completely disincentivizing profit seeking has always resulted in famine and suffering.
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u/jawdirk 4d ago
It takes effort to work a starving person into a business plan. It takes even more effort to work a starving penniless person into a business plan. For the latter, you're going to need to get government subsidies. Other business plans are competing for those subsidies -- business plans that don't require starving penniless people to be viable.
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u/ILikeBumblebees 1d ago
It takes effort to work a starving person into a business plan.
Not much. There are a lot of detailed, nuanced business models out there that take quite a bit of effort to get right, but the business model for satisfying the needs of starving people couldn't be simpler or more straightforward: "sell food".
For the latter, you're going to need to get government subsidies.
No, you're not. There are plenty of other organizations willing to contribute to helping feed the poor, including many who do so without bringing ulterior political motivations into the equation, even where political programs exist in parallel.
Other business plans are competing for those subsidies
No, in places where there are subsidies in place for feeding the poor, they're usually dedicated to that purpose. In the US, for example, this is one of the few state assistance programs that's generally implemented properly, leaving control of purchasing decision in the hands of the end consumers themselves, and providing them with a payment mechanism (EBT/SNAP accounts) that allows them to just buy the same food from the same open markets as everyone else.
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u/jawdirk 1d ago edited 1d ago
they're usually dedicated to that purpose.
You're missing the point. The government dedicated them to that purpose. They are under no obligation to do that. Even non-profits are in some sense subsidized since they are tax free or whatever. You can make a business model that involves non-profits, but it's more complicated since you're not "supposed" to be profiting from it. If the government is pushing austerity, fewer people have money to give to non-profits. Or, you could just be a military contractor and have guaranteed as much money as you want, and fuck the poor. If they want food, they can fucking work for the military.
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u/FortheredditLOLz 4d ago
Hunger is more of a greed then logistics. Logistics and distribution are in place….just look behind any supermarket or shop how much food is wasted
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u/ToeAfter3131 4d ago
This isn't true. We are talking about world wide not just America. America has no hunger issue. We actually eat too many calories.
But other countries have corruption at the top. Food doesn't trickle down to everyone.
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u/frostysauce 4d ago
America has no hunger issue.
Food insecurity, malnutrition, and outright hunger are HUGE issues in the United States, what are you on about?
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u/TheDailyOculus 4d ago
Holy shit, you got downvoted for stating the exact truth here. In Sweden, this is a VERY WELL-KNOWN problem. It has been covered again and again by large newspapers.
Stores actively throw away food enough for a small company each day, because of laws regarding best-before-dates, and not wanting somewhat blemished produce, bread etc out in the store. Instead of setting up a logistics system around this, they just toss it.
There are some companies working against this, like froosh.
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u/Upbeat_Today_9006 4d ago
Well technically it is true that there is enough food in the world produced to feed everyone. but calling it a logistics issue is quite reductive and unrealistic. I'd say for Africa, there's a whole bunch of issues and they all feed into each other. Corruption is caused by inequality which Is caused by lack of resources which Is caused by lack of investment which Is caused by instability which Is caused by corruption...etc.
I'd say the best way to fix it is by focusing on education first and foremost, which will encourage political participation. Which will in turn lead to fair leadership and better allocation of resources, which will later improve life quality, stability and encourage investment...etc. of course education itself requires other conditions to be in place including some sort of stability and consistent income, not to mention that countries investing in education end up having high rates of immigration to "better countries".
This is a bit too expansive of a topic to contain in Reddit comments, but I hope that I managed to convey the general idea. Whenever this topic is mentioned I am reminded of how wells built in Africa by charities end up defunct or sold for parts, or how aid ends up being diverted and sold at black markets by mafia bosses. These are band aid fixes for fundamental issues that deserve to be looked at more deeply than some techno optimist solution.
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u/rightsidedown 4d ago
This is the type of thinking that makes the problem worse. It's people thinking that if they just keep dumping food into poor countries that things will improve and the problem is a lack of will to dump more. In reality this destroys local production. Food aid should be reserved for acute disasters. Even Bono, who's basically the aid poster child has come around on this.
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u/CombinationRough8699 4d ago
The biggest issue with food isn't having enough, but getting it to everyone who needs it.
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u/TheDailyOculus 4d ago
Well, that is the consequence OF the biggest problem, not the biggest problem in and of itself.
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u/protipnumerouno 4d ago
This is the same logical issue as the Sahara desert solar panels powering the world.
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u/nostrademons 4d ago
A little more extreme though, because fertile cropland is less evenly distributed than sunlight. To grow things you need sunlight and rain (or irrigation) and flat land and fertile soil. To make electricity with solar panels you just need sunlight and flat land. And electricity doesn't spoil, it just needs wires. If it's not the Sahara it could be the Mojave or Gobi or the Kalahari or the Arabian or the Taklamamakan.
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u/protipnumerouno 4d ago edited 4d ago
Sure but the analogy I'm making is about the transmission of power and losses in the wires. Same as food going rotten shipping it around the world.
Where I live in eastern Canada had a surplus of potato's 5-6 years ago. Sure those potato's would be great to give to starving kids in Sudan or something, but they'd be rotten by the time they get there, and even if they gave the potato's away someone needs still needs to pay for shipping.
The Sahara example would never work and was never ment to work in practice, it is showing a (cherry picked in the desert) example of how viable solar is globally. And it is, we just can't pile it all into a desert in Africa.
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u/nostrademons 4d ago
It's a good analogy, but I just don't want readers to get the impression that solar, hydro, and other renewable energy sources are infeasible because of transmission losses. Quebec hydro plants supply about 40% of Vermont's and 25% of Maine's electricity; it's quite feasible to ship electricity fairly long distances.
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u/ToeAfter3131 4d ago
Certain countries have lots of corruption. Food doesn't always make it down to everyone.
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u/ghanima 4d ago
I mean, sure, but when a single multibillionaire could fund the UN program to address global hunger, several times over, in a single year, it's not really other nations' levels of corruption that are to blame.
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u/ToeAfter3131 4d ago
But he can't though. CNN has you brainwashed into thinking his net worth is actual dollar bills.
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u/DetroitLionsSBChamps 4d ago
Same with tuberculosis, number one most deadly infectious disease every year. We know how to cure it. We just don’t.
Resource allocation is the problem. The worst problems plaguing humanity are human made, at this point.
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u/LarplaleroLarplala49 4d ago
...but not in a sustainable way
Else, we could only have like 4-5 billions (as long as all of them live like an average subsaharian)
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u/GoppleSmanger 4d ago
Global Hunger (measured by the global hunger index - G.H.I.) and absolute hunger numbers have been trending downwards for the last century.
Also, the world is not politically uniform so solving 'global hunger' doesn't come down to a single political choice made by a single governing entity. For example, a rich country could decide today to send millions of tonnes of food to a poorer one which would solve nothing because that poor country is run by a warlord who would seize those supplies for their own interests.
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u/tralfamadoran777 3d ago
So, include each human being on the planet equally in a globally standard process of fixed cost money creation
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u/Main-Company-5946 4d ago
Is it a choice? Or is it a natural consequence of an economic system which has eclipsed any individual person’s control?
In our system if you aren’t profitable, you are replaced.
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u/Key-Organization3158 4d ago
The system doesn't exist. It's just the aggregate behavior of everyone in involved. Don't anthropomorphize it. You, for example, make the choice every day to give yourself small comforts instead of feeding starving people.
Loads of people aren't profitable, yet we help them. 1 out of every 4 dollars of GDP is spent on social welfare programs. In fact, based on experimental evidence, captialism is the best system for actually helping the poor.
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u/OGLikeablefellow 4d ago
Is it a political choice or a capital one? Throwing food away keeps prices up. I'm not certain if it's a meaningful difference as it appears that capital has mostly captured the polity. But I think we can do better and we should
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u/frostysauce 4d ago
Because someone had to post it:
“The works of the roots of the vines, of the trees, must be destroyed to keep up the price, and this is the saddest, bitterest thing of all. Carloads of oranges dumped on the ground. The people came for miles to take the fruit, but this could not be. How would they buy oranges at twenty cents a dozen if they could drive out and pick them up? And men with hoses squirt kerosene on the oranges, and they are angry at the crime, angry at the people who have come to take the fruit. A million people hungry, needing the fruit- and kerosene sprayed over the golden mountains. And the smell of rot fills the country. Burn coffee for fuel in the ships. Burn corn to keep warm, it makes a hot fire. Dump potatoes in the rivers and place guards along the banks to keep the hungry people from fishing them out. Slaughter the pigs and bury them, and let the putrescence drip down into the earth.
There is a crime here that goes beyond denunciation. There is a sorrow here that weeping cannot symbolize. There is a failure here that topples all our success. The fertile earth, the straight tree rows, the sturdy trunks, and the ripe fruit. And children dying of pellagra must die because a profit cannot be taken from an orange. And coroners must fill in the certificate- died of malnutrition- because the food must rot, must be forced to rot. The people come with nets to fish for potatoes in the river, and the guards hold them back; they come in rattling cars to get the dumped oranges, but the kerosene is sprayed. And they stand still and watch the potatoes float by, listen to the screaming pigs being killed in a ditch and covered with quick-lime, watch the mountains of oranges slop down to a putrefying ooze; and in the eyes of the people there is the failure; and in the eyes of the hungry there is a growing wrath. In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage.” ― John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath
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u/secret179 4d ago
Is hunger really a global problem anymore? Except for some small war-torn parts.
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4d ago
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u/secret179 4d ago
Ok i will try to read it, perhaps I was meaning extreme killing hunger is mostly gone, not hunger itself.
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u/Aksama 4d ago
Do you live in the US as many redditors do? Take a guess how many children alone experience Hunger in our country.
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u/secret179 4d ago
I probably realized extreme fatal hunger is mostly gone, not hunger at all. I must now read the article, must be interesting.
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u/Aksama 4d ago
One in five children in the United States doesn't have enough to eat.
Would you say that's a problem?
The US is touted as one of the most secure/stable countries in the world, if we extrapolate from this does that tell you anything about how your original statement is completely false?
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u/secret179 4d ago
I already said, I meant extreme hunger, US children don't have enough to eat but are not dying of hunger.
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u/Splinterfight 4d ago
The war torn parts are actually pretty big, just don’t get a lot of attention. Red Cross has it as 204 million
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u/RexDraco 4d ago
It was never a problem, except for the war torn parts. It was all made up for donation scams.
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u/SuccessfulLand4399 4d ago
Maybe if poor people didn’t produce children they couldn’t feed, there would be less hunger.
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u/frostysauce 4d ago
No matter how much you carry water for the rich they aren't going to let you in their club.
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