UN Commercial to Feed Hungry Schoolchildren

The New American

Written by Nima Sanandaji

I have seen this commercial perhaps a hundred times on Swedish television. And each time I thought to myself: ”Shouldn’t he also roll out the bill of total foreign aid, of some $120 billion dollars annually? And can you explain why this doesn’t feed every hungry schoolchild 40 times over?” But then I realized that the most interesting question was why the commercial was shown in the first place.

The ad is paid for by the UN World Food Programme. And on their homepage one can find that it is not only translated to Swedish, but also to Italian, Spanish, Norwegian, Finnish, French, Danish, and German.
Let's for one moment set aside the fact that researchers such as Nobel Prize winner Amartya Sen have demonstrated that hunger very rarely occurs in "democracies," or that research based on more than half a century's experience has shown us that foreign aid does not foster prosperity but rather dependence. Let's assume that foreign aid is indeed the solution to poverty and hunger.

Why still would the UN World Food Programme show this ad across Europe, week after week and month after month? After all, the message of the ad isn’t that the TV audience should contribute to foreign aid, but rather simply that the UN is doing a great job. And that money spent on the UN is much better, much more humanitarian and utilitaritarian, than money spent on the United States or the EU.

I have to say that Penn does make a good point in this commercial. All of the money wasted on those stupid wars and bailouts could have gone to something, ANYTHING better than what they were spent on.

The author of the article makes some good points as well; foreign aid only creates dependence and giving money to the UN to solve our problems? Gimme a break.


Still it really puts into prespective just how much our governments have wasted on garbage programs.


Politicians, it's time to kick 'em all to the curb.





[edit on 9-1-2010 by FortAnthem]

The UN has been unable to feed starving children in 70 years of existence but nobody finds it odd?

It was allegedly one of their main goals.

In actuality, their main goal is depopulation, and starving 3rd world children for generations has kept populations down by untold millions.

Originally posted by Deny Arrogance
The UN has been unable to feed starving children in 70 years of existence but nobody finds it odd?

It was allegedly one of their main goals.

In actuality, their main goal is depopulation, and starving 3rd world children for generations has kept populations down by untold millions.

Yeah riiight,
thats waht made the third world - the UN.

Originally posted by audas

Yeah riiight,
thats waht made the third world - the UN.

The third world was made by corrupt repressive governemnts. The UN and the IMF made sure they stayed there. With a little help from US foreign policy of course.