Poor Haitians resort to eating dirt

and this is why people continue to go hungry... talk talk talk... blah blah blah... debate as to whether it works or not.... sheesh....


there are many organizations that do great work that can be supported for a few dollars a day... i posted a link to worl vision haiti and no one commented... more likely, people thought, world vision doesn't help... they just feed themselves... even if that was the case and only a small part of a donation got through to someone, is that not better than nothing? i can personally vouch for World Vision and Oxfam to name but two humanitarian organizations I've donated to, work with and promoted over the years and have seen first hand the good they do....

time to act people.... talk is cheap.... that is, if you really care

Originally posted by biggie smalls
reply to post by Bunch

 

Every little bit counts...Start with reducing your dependency on foreign products and food services. The less you can make do, the more that is leftover for those who are left without.

Although I applaud your efforts, your last statement is just blatantly wrong. Once the food enters our country, it's written off. It will either be eaten or just thrown away. I can't tell you how many chickens have gone bad in my fridge while I continued to eat out.

If Americans were more efficient with our food, then I'd say you are right, but it doesn't matter how little people make do with, in regards to helping others. Unless we did this en masse as a country, it won't make a difference at all.

Originally posted by biggie smalls


The problem with a GMO is that it attacks native plants. If you are growing any other crops, the GMO takes over. They are invasive species and no natural predators can harm them.

The information you are providing is terrible. It really is. I actually grow crops. I have fields of round up ready canola filled with bertha army worms.

Please tell me how to get rid of them.

www.gov.mb.ca...


The Canola grows fine next to regular crops of wheat, barley, oats etc. There is nothing wrong with the product.

Originally posted by Bunch
reply to post by Rockpuck

 

You got to be kidding me, people that are starving in this planet are starving while many of us sit down in Country Buffet and eat are guts out. Then the food thats is left is thrown away in the trash.

People are starving because they dont have money, tell me who was the last person with money to die of starvation (People in Hollywood dont count)

This is a problem of caring for a fellow human being, nothing else.
[edit on 29-1-2008 by Bunch]

Put your table scraps in a plastic baggy and mail it to Haiti for all I care.. I will never support artificial stimulus to support vast growing populations...

Famines are natures way to keep humanity in check, when Ireland had its great famine there where 8 million people on the little island, since then in the 1800 the population has never went over 6 million.. not even today.. it expanded and could not support its self, nature gave it a correction.

Populations in Haiti, many central American countries, Africa, Asia, Poorer Europe.. they are propped up on artificial stimulus that the population reaches levels it NEVER should have...

No, I don't think we should help them, they where not meant to have that many people, nature will bring them to the level they should.

And I wont feel guilty about eating at a buffet either, not that I eat that nasty food anyways, synthetic crap.. I would rather eat the dirt quite honestly.

But I expect you to put your food in a baggy and mail it to Haiti, if there is one thing I hate more then someone out to save every soul is a hypocrite talking down from his self righteous pedestal and not abiding by his own words.

Dulcimer,

We are in this mess thanks to petroleum based nitrogen fertilizers.

The only way we can have abundance for all is to use 100% natural means.

Composting waste (human, animal, and plant) creates soil very rapidly.

I plan on teaching permaculture in Africa sometime soon to help these people who just want to be able to eat.

The problem with petroleum based fertilizers et all is that it involves the importing of raw materials.

The fertilizer can be produced on site everywhere in the world (possibly excluding the arctic circle) with a little bit of common sense and hard work.

Humanure composting toilet

worm composting



Compost builds soil. We do not need to use non-native plants that do not improve the soil.

If we use beneficial plant guilds that work together, there will be no need for fertilizer in the first place.

A guild is a harmonious assembly of plants (but it could be plants and animals) the essential characteristic being a diverse mixture (polyculture) whose elements all have a purpose. The plants are chosen to be beneficial to each other, and so it is similar to companion planting.

You can plant nitrogen-fixing crops around your main food sources instead of chemical fertilizers.

I am absolutely certain that scientific, agricutural and education solutions to these problems could be provided but until we address the cultural and political issues which help maintain the current situation then nothing will change.

I also think that certain "controlling interests" use the existence of "the starving millions" as a tool to help control the masses within our societies.

... and the GoreHeads/environmentalists continue to push for Ethanol, which is nothing more than subsidized food burning.

reply to post by Dulcimer


I don't think I said every non-native species is harmful, but GMOs are not the route to take to deal with starvation.

We do not know what we're doing in the lab in relation to nature. It would be one thing if we were out in the fields cross-pollinating beneficial plants. It is another thing to splice DNA of anything.

We are behaving irrational towards our environment and many problems today is because we work against nature and not with it.

Mother Nature wants us to live. She provides much more than we need. We just need to start managing our resources appropriately. Simple as that.

Last year I planted and harvested 160 acres of organic oats for a neighbor. The field was about 4 miles or so from my personal fields of oats.

I produced about 3 times as much as the organic oats. The organic field had 3 years worth of natural material in it to use as fertilizer.

The organic farmer is now broke.


In a world with a population like this, you need all you can get while you can get it. If every farmer produced yields like our organic friend, we be eating dirt long ago.

I don't see many people producing gardens either.

reply to post by Quazga


You won't help anyone with that kind of attitude. If you are not eating your food, don't buy it in the first place.

On second thought, create a compost bin of your waste (paper included- worms love paper and cardboard products) instead of adding to an already problematic landfill situation.

I throw away food as well so I'm not singling you out. Its frustrating as this is a nation (and certainly worldwide) issue of food.

When we have 'better' sources available we have no problem tossing the 'bad' food.

Some make do with rotten and moldy food as its all they have.

I agree this needs to be a wide range effort and not only a few people.

reply to post by Rockpuck


I myself for the record participate in many military and church humanitarian campaigns.

And im not dismissing your point at all, but all Im trying to say is that why then caring about what happen in other countries like Iran, Irak, Israel and not bother about what happen in Haiti. If we aint going to care then lets not care at all and the world go to waste.

reply to post by never_tell


It is not the Charities or the Aid Workers themselves I am critical of, they deserve the upmost respect, it is the bribary, corruption and exploitation within the countries themselves by government officials, tribal chieftains etc who are at times the biggest inhibitors of progress.

reply to post by Dulcimer


I am not talking about purely organic produce.

Organic is great, but it doesn't go far enough. You can not use chemical fertilizers, but still plant conventionally.

If you really are farming, I would suggest researching "Permaculture" as it will increase your yield guaranteed.

You may not have as much of one particular crop, but you will have a more diverse yield and certainly hardier.

"Monoculture" as one-crop planting is called attracts pests that would not be there if there were plants that attracted predator insects and birds.

reply to post by Alxandro



I agree with you for once. I do not think we should be using food stuffs for energy sources.

I don't think anyone mentioned ethanol though.

I personally think ethanol is a terrible solution to a widespread problem.

I think you are referring to 'biofuels' which I am certainly a proponent of.

Switchgrass, algae, and hemp have been proven to produce more power (and yield) per acre than corn anyway.

reply to post by Freeborn


well that's everywhere... might as well be talking about Katrina... frankly, i find that kind of reasoning to be the most disturbing... so what if governments are corrupt.... what are we going to do about it? anything? even if supplies are stolen, doesn't it make it worth it for someone to know that at least someone tried to help? the worst form of tyranny is indifference... IMO


btw, this is not a personal attack....

I don't understand how you could use this "permaculture" to produce grains. The end result would be so full of junk that it would be useless.

The end result would be a bunch of dockage.

When canola is delivered to a licensed primary or terminal elevator and/or to a crushing plant, a representative sample is drawn. This sample is used for determining grade and dockage. Dockage is defined under the Canada Grain Act as " any material intermixed with a parcel of grain, other than kernels of grain of a standard of quality fixed by or under this Act for a grade of that grain, that must and can be separated from the parcel of grain before that grade can be assigned to the grain". In other words, dockage in canola refers to the readily removable foreign material that is removed in the cleaning process. Dockage is removed by following set procedures as described by the "Official Grain Grading Guide".

Look at the amount of farm land in the world right now. The land is not growing, it is shrinking due to population growth and urban centers.

We are basically in a food shortage situation in the world right now. If we were to cut our yields now, we would be worse off.

I only had to look at the permaculture idea for a minute to realize it would never work. In your backyard, maybe. On a global scale... no way.

reply to post by Dulcimer


Right now I am designing a 30 acre permaculture design for my school.

How about you tell Holmgren that it doesn't work? He'd surely be surprised.

Yeomans designed a broad-scale design called "Key-Line" that focuses on large scale implementation: www.keyline.com.au... .

Permaculture is working right now in places where the land was crappy as anything.

Here, I'll get you some youtube videos.

I believe your heart is in the right place, but I don't agree with you.















This last one is my favorite. If you don't watch anything else, but this one I will be very happy. Its called "Greening The Desert - Permaculture in Action" and I highly recommend it:

reply to post by Bunch


I agree.. we only care for and help those who can offer us something in return..

Yes even those we help in Africa, give us something.. Haiti will get nothing, because they can give nothing.

reply to post by never_tell


I am not saying that aid isn't required or that we shouldn't offer technological assisitance too, just that the other issues need addressing too.
At present we bury our head in the sand and completely ignore the corruption and exploitation.
Look at what is happening in Zimbabwe; once known as "the bread basket of Africa" it is now heading towards complete collapse due to the corruption of one man and his cronies.
Do we now plough millions and millions into a country where no aid should have been needed at all?
How morallly inept are we to allow this to happen?

There is no easy, miracle wonder cure to poverty; we need more than just giving aid.

Oh, it never crossed my mind that it may have been a personal attack.

[edit on 29-1-2008 by Freeborn]

reply to post by Rockpuck


Wow man that has to be the single most heartless thing I have ever read in my life. (up to this point I thought I had written the single most heartless thing ever)

Seriously I do agree that overpopulation eventually leads to disease and starvation. This happens in the animal kingdom all the time. I cannot condone giving people that have reached past the limits that their environment can sustain them the ability to further tax an already overtaxed level of sustainment.

It is cold and something that no one wants to see, a country starving and people forced to eat dirt in order to survive. However is it the lesser of two evils? In my opinion yes it is. It is a terrible price to curtail further suffering down the road by even more people that will not have the resources to sustain themselves.

One must realize that this planet is grossly overpopulated by humans that the environment cannot sustain. We have no real natural predators so nature has to find and will find a way to balance the scales.