Special Report: 20 Million People in the World Are Dying of Starvation Unnecessarily

How can we feed them? How can we help them feed themselves?

The origin of this posting is Thanksgiving Day 1960 when I was 13 years old. Following Thanksgiving dinner with my family in Borough Park Brooklyn, my grandmother cleared away dinner, folded up the gate-legged  wooden table, and opened the maple wood doors at the cabinet where she hid the television set. She’s turned on the set and we watched Edward R, Murrow’s Harvest of Shame.

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"This is CBS Reports Harvest of Shame," announced Edward R. Murrow. "It has to do with the men, women, and children who harvest the crops in this country of ours, the best-fed nation on earth.

"These are the forgotten people, the under-protected, the under-educated, the under-clothed, the under-fed. We present this report on Thanksgiving because were it not for the labor of the people you are going to meet, you might not starve, but your table would not be laden with  the luxuries that we have all come to regard as essentials. We should like you to meet some of your fellow citizens who harvest the food for the best-fed nation on earth."
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 ++++ Edward R. Murrow based his broadcast from Belle Glade, Florida which in 1960 was a home to a domestic migrant stream. By 1974, that stream was drying up--replaced in large part by the globalization of agricultural workers willing to do work U.S. citizens regarded as beneath our dignity.

The rich swampland of Belle Glade is the equivalent of agricultural gold. Anything planted in its rich soil will grow. By the 1970s, the soil was treated with astonishing disrespect. U.S. Sugar and other growers produced sugar cane there--a crop that has no rational economic reason for being grown in the United States. 

The economist David Ricardo (1772-1823), hero of mine, pointed to the irrationality of growing sugar in Florida when it is far less expensive to import it from countries in Central and South America, in Africa and elsewhere where foolish U.S. food policy imposes tariffs which keep in business U.S. sugar cane and beet producers who are less efficient and would be better off producing instead a valuable commodity on our precious soil.

It is not often I agree with the American Enterprise Institute, but when it comes to sugar (an obsession of mine) the current protectionist policies of the U.S. government—enshrined in the 2018 farm biill—wastes at considerable cost to the US treasury 900,000 acres of land which would nest be used for other purple.

Consequently, sugar protectionism threatens our producers of rice, wheat, corn, and soybeans whose ability to pay their children's college tuition is dependent upon exports. 

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The coup putting 93 year-old Robert Mugabe under house arrest [1] is one of three major international stories to break this week. For 37 years Zimbabwe’s corrupt regime has turned the “breadbasket” of southern Africa [2]into a net importer of food. 
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See this exciting report from South Africa television: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sW-xXZqrGKc

BBC: "Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe has resigned, parliament speaker Jacob Mudenda has said. A letter from Mr Mugabe said that the decision was voluntary and that he had made it to allow a smooth transfer of power, the Reuters news agency reports. The surprise announcement halted an impeachment hearing that had begun against him. Lawmakers roared in jubilation and people have begun celebrating in the streets. Mr Mugabe had previously refused to resign despite last week's military takeover and days of protests. He has been in power since independence in 1980."
 BBC News: Published on Nov 21, 2017.
 

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Currently, a child starves to death every 10 minutes in Yemen.

Earlier this week the UN Security Council heard legitimate concern that in the wake of a Saudi Arabia boycott of critical humanitarian supplies, Yemen is at risk of becoming the most severe crisis in a world filled with severe crises. Yemen’s shortage of food is putting 17.8 million people at risk of dying from starvation. Currently, a child starves to death every 10 minutes in Yemen. Meanwhile, our too little too late Secretary of State is in Myanmar where a minority Moslem population is at risk of genocide from the country’s majority Buddhist population.

Refugee camps in neighboring Bangladesh are filled to overflowing as the county’s leadership puts fleeing refugees back into leaking boats to return to the danger they fled. As millions of people are dying in the world, the Los Angeles Times in one of the few news outlets in the US to provide coverage. Almost certainly, Meet the Press and the other Sunday network news programs will ignore death and suffering on a massive scale.

Instead, the vast majority of US  reporters focus to the exclusion of everything else on Jeff Sessions testimony before a House of Representatives oversight committee. Can not reporters provide at least 10 percent of their efforts [tithe] on life and death issues instead of concentrating  in exhaustive detail the tawdry sexual behavior of the Republican nominee running in the Senate Alabama race?  Why cannot we be spared repetition until we all can memorize each of the  President’s irrational tweets?

Wordsworth wrote”the world is too much with us.” Not in the isolationist United States where our role as an example of world leadership—painfully acquired during World War II—diminishes daily..

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Zimbabwe was once the “breadbasket” of Southern Africa

Los Angeles Times correspondent Robyn Dixon reported from Harare, Zimbabwe on November `5, 2017:

“As the country descended into economic ruin, Mugabe became an international outcast for his misrule. He blamed the problems on whites and political enemies.

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“In the early 2000s, Mugabe sanctioned the invasion of hundreds of white-owned farms by black veterans of the liberation war and other government supporters, a land grab that resulted in the deaths of farmers and political opponents. Supporters praised him for standing up for the black majority against Western imperialists.

“But in recent years, Mugabe has been abandoned by even some of his most ardent supporters, including South Africa’s Economic Freedom Fighters party, which wants South Africa to confiscate land from whites.

“’The EFF appreciates that some of the pain caused in Zimbabwe was due to imperialist actions, but a significant component of this was self-inflicted,” it tweeted Wednesday as it called on Zuma to offer Mugabe political asylum. ‘ President Mugabe cannot insist on remaining in power even when he is physically incapable of doing so.’”

http://www.latimes.com/world/africa/la-fg-zimbabwe-military-takeover-20171115-story.html

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Yemen: “It will be the largest famine the world has seen in many decades with millions of victims.”

From the about section of this EuroNews You Tube video:

Yemen is facing a devastating famine unless the current air, sea and land blockade imposed by the Saudi-led coalition is lifted. “It will be the largest famine the world hasn’t seen for many decades, with millions of victims,” *UN under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator Mark Lowcock* told reporters. He had briefed the UN Security Council on the humanitarian situation in the country. He had been asked to brief the UNSC which held a closed-door meeting … See : http://www.euronews.com/2017/11/09/mi…

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Genocide in Myanmar

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Meanwhile, a sharply divided Congress fiddles while the world burns

Confirmation hearings of Attorney General Jeff Sessions whose “contribution” to the death taking place globally is to secure the borders and round up illegal aliens.

NOVEMBER 14, 2017

Meanwhile, back in the real world: Who is feeding the millions who are starving?

United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), also known as the UN Refugee Agency, is a United Nations programme mandated to protect and support refugees at the request of a government or the UN itself and assists in their voluntary repatriation, local integration or resettlement to a third country. Its headquarters are in Geneva, Switzerland, and it is a member of the United Nations Development Group.^[1]The UNHCR has won two Nobel Peace Prizes, once in 1954 and again in 1981.

—Wikipedia, of course

Myanmar/Bangladesh

From the field: Emergency Response Coordinator in Bangladesh

I’ve met so many brave Rohingya families who have little more than the clothes on their back and the weight of their trauma and loss. And the painful memories of the violence that forced them to flee their homes.

https://www.unrefugees.org/news/from-the-field-emergency-response-coordinator-in-bangladesh/

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Yemen

UNHCR’s country representative, Ayman Gharaibeh, warns war is tearing the fabric of Yemen apart and creating a humanitarian catastrophe.

AMMAN, Jordan – Since war broke out in Yemen in March 2015, the fabric of the country has been disintegrating and the population of 27.4 million suffering untold hardship and misery. The situation there has been described as a ‘humanitarian catastrophe’ and without help many more people, especially children, will die from violence, lack of food and water, illness or disease.

AymanGharaibeh, UNHCR’s Representative to Yemen, is leading the UN Refugee Agency’s humanitarian operations and response across the country. The experienced humanitarian aid worker previously served in Yemen with UNHCR from 1992 to 1994. Gharaibeh spoke to Public Information Officer ShabiaMantoo about the desperate situation there.

https://www.unrefugees.org/news/what-is-happening-in-yemen-update-from-unhcr-representative/

United Nations High Commission for Refugees:

“Yemen is in the grips of one of the worst humanitarian catastrophes in the world — two million have been forced to flee their homes because of increased violence in the country – more than 18 million innocent Yemenis are in immediate need of humanitarian assistance, many risk starvation.”

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Sudan

“Amid increasing violence and deteriorating conditions, the situation in South Sudan has escalated into a full-blown humanitarian emergency.

“The total number of South Sudanese refugees has now passed two million, it is the largest refugee crisis in Africa, and the third largest in the world, after Syria and Afghanistan. Sadly, 63 percent of South Sudanese refugees are under the age of 18.” –UNHCR

“The vast majority of South Sudanese refugees are finding refuge in neighboring Uganda. Currently, Uganda is hosting more than one million refugees – 82 percent are women and children.”

“The majority of those fleeing South Sudan are women and children. They are survivors of violent attacks, sexual assault and in many cases, children are traveling alone.

“Often, they arrive weak and malnourished. When the rainy season comes, their needs are compounded by flooding, food shortages and disease.”

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Constitutional removal of President Trump is imperative if the U.S. is to regain its position following World War II as global leader responding in a timely manner to catastrophes to prevent even more widespread suffering and economic destruction

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Budget would restructure a diminished commitment to international food aid

WASHINGTON — President Donald J. Trump’s budget proposal sharply reduces the U.S. commitment to international food assistance. The United States provides most emergency and developmental food assistance under P.L. 480 Title II, also known as Food for Peace. This initiative was launched in 1954 by President Dwight D. Eisenhower when he signed into law what became known as the Food for Peace Act. The purpose was two-fold: to answer the urgent humanitarian call to feed the world’s hungry, which was deemed to be in accord with national security interests, while providing an outlet for the incredible bounty of U.S. agriculture.  

Congress appropriates funding each year to P.L. 480 Title II as part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture budget. The program itself is administered by the Office of Food for Peace in the State Department’s U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).

President Trump’s budget would eliminate all U.S.D.A. funding for P.L. 480 Title II. Instead, funding for fiscal year (F.Y.) 2018 emergency international food assistance, a proposed $1.1 billion, would be funneled through the International Disaster Account at USAID.  This compared with P.L. 480 Title II funding for F.Y. 2017 at an estimated $1,713 million and actual spending in F.Y. 2016 at $1,716 million. This would translate to a cut of more than $600 million in international food assistance from the estimate for the current year.

At the same time, the administration proposed to lower funding for the I.D.A. account itself in F.Y. 2018 by $900 million from F.Y. 2017, to $2.5 billion.

“The U.S. government will urge other donors, including non-traditional donors, to increase funding for humanitarian assistance and lessen the burden on the United States to respond,” the State Department’s budget request stated.

--http://www.foodbusinessnews.net/articles/news_home/Business_News/2017/05/Budget_would_restructure_a_dim.aspx?ID=%7B41C936C5-1425-4AA7-A8A3-F381CA27B64B%7D&cck=1

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There was bad news for the United Nations last week, as President Donald Trump announced he is seeking a 28 percent budget cut for diplomacy and foreign aid, which includes an unspecified reduction in funding to the United Nations and its agencies. VOA's U.N. Correspondent Margaret Besheer reports that the potential cuts come as the U.N. is struggling to cope with an unprecedented number of conflicts, approaching famines and the effects of climate change. Originally published at - http://www.voanews.com/a/united-natio...

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Footnotes

1. South African Broadcast Corporation (SABC) News is an excellent source of the latest news on the transition from Mugabe’s 37 years controlling power in Zimbabwe. http://www.sabcnews.com/newspage/
2. “Because of its highly productive land and vast agricultural
   potentialities, Zimbabwe used to be not only selfsufficient
   but also produce surplus crops for exports.
   However, the situation has changed in the recent years to
   the extent that the country can no longer feed itself and
   has to depend on foreign aids. This problem is to a great
   extent caused by the so-called Structural Adjustment
   Program promoted by the World Bank; and partly by the
   political turmoil which resulted in the imposition of
   different types of sanctions on the country. Consequently,
   the Zimbabwean agricultural system becomes weak and
   weaker. It is however, expected that these negative
   phenomena could be successfully turnaround and
   changed for the better. But without selfless and focus
   leadership, this change will be mere a mirage.” —Zimbabwe’s agricultural industry by Ahmed Audu Maiyaki

 

References

Maiyaki, Ahmed Audu. Zimbabwe’s agricultural industry. African Journal of Business Management.Vol. 4(19), pp. 4159-4166, December Special Review, 2010

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This posting copyright © 2017 by Joel Solkoff. All rights reserved.