I Can End World Hunger, Tonight! Care To Know How?

I have an idea which i have been talking to people about and i would love to get it up and going because i feel i can help so many people anyway my idea is "Seed the world" what do you think? obviously there are a lot of things like irrigation and soil location, clean water, teaching people etc but you get what i mean

reply to post by gimme_some_truth


Apparently the problem is the people then.
Because if you look at the grand scale, just say almost 1 billion starving people...
But our gov't spends 787 billion on banks, for our loans....
$1 trillion healthcare...over ten years of course...


Enough said.

The people in power don't want to feed the world.
Probably because they can't profit from that.


This is why our world leaders are disgustingly greedy idiots.
(because there is a way to end huge issues, hunger included)
They don't want to spend money, they want to earn it.

IMHO, I think our tax money makes a huge circle to line pockets.
It is actually never used for what they say it is used for.






Good thread.

A major problem causing world hunger, especially among the poor in developed countries, is actually quite simple to solve. We spend far too much on transportation, handling, etc... of the foods which about 80% of the time can be produced within a 50-100 mile radius of the place it is being sold. When you factor in the cost of shipping, fuel, handling, and other expenditures then that price is dumped onto the consumer. Add to that fact it creates more bureaucracy and raises the hassle on the farmer which has been a leading cause for farmers to abandon their profession.

With less farmers able to produce the goods then the produce is either managed poorer or the amount of produce drops thus raising the prices. Why should the farmer have to rely so heavily on these middle men who profit at their expense when they can take their produce and sell it either by themselves at a local market or sell it to a local market for sale rather than dealing with the middle man?

Produce and sell locally would result in farming becoming a more enjoyable profession while at the same time lowering food prices. With the lowered food prices and growing abundance of food more people would be fed at a low rate of cost.

Regarding those in impoverished nations not only would this help to keep the population in balance proportion to the sustainability level of the local region but it would also encourage farmers in poor areas to both sell locally but also produce foods which are unique to their area for national and international sale at higher rates thus allowing them to push more capital into the local economy.

The problem is not that we have a lack of food it is that we have a lack of common sense.

reply to post by gimme_some_truth


to be blunt - no you cannot

your plan is simply a scheme to throw vast ammounts of money around

im nost countries where parts of the population face starvation - money - or lack of it is not the issue

and infact throwing more money at it - will just make the situation worse

you first need to remove an entire parasitic layer of criminals , corrupt government etc etc

before anything will happen

a poster child example is rhodesia - thier plight is 100% the result of a failed government

reply to post by gimme_some_truth


Just quick math with your base numbers tells me it would cost almost 40 trillion a year.

Regular society does not care... my kids and I are happy for a $1 box of macaroni for supper and if we are lucky a cheeseburger or a real meal on such on occasion. The ladies at work will let their $15 lunch takeout chinese or pizza or whatever rot in the fridge at work for weeks before they offer to let others take the remainders home before it rots.
I clean the fridge at work once every few weeks when things are slow, and throw away takeout that would have fed my kids for days...and days... (and I work for a very small company by the way, 5 other lpeople in the office)
People are spoiled, don't realize the waste, don't realize what hunger is. They don't realize how much that $12-15 takeout would've actually bought for meals for people who actually need the food.

But I think they are about to.

I don't mean to rant, but people are so wasteful, and don't realize it. Or just don't care because it is not them.

OK OK OK. After reading everyones post I think I finally figured out a way that would meet OP halfway and not break the bank (40 trillion).

In other countries, such as India, if you travel there, your daily food cost is going to be $1. Unless you are eating a LOT of food then it will be more. In the US though let us keep the $15 a day per person figure.

According to Census.gov there are 311,469,431 People in the U.S.

So that would cost 15 x 311,469,431 x 365 = 1,705,295,134,725

OK So about 1.7 Trillion USD. I don't know about you but $105 a week for food is really high in my opinion. It also depends on the type of food you are eating.

What if we had a program that credited grocery stores for certain food purchases (think healthy) but had no credit or subsidies for junk food.

For example say you go to the grocery store, you buy a bunch of vegetables, and a 2L bottle of soda, and a bag of chips. You would end up paying only for the Soda & Chips but nothing for the veggies as it would be subsidized. Now I can see how this would become a problem, people taking more than they need. So you would need a limit, and probably some government card that keeps that limit in check. You don't want someone going into multiple stores and taking all their bananas, then letting them rot at home because they can't eat them all. ... now that I think about it... this sounds familiar.. close to communism but with a twist.

What if food was grown locally instead of being transported hundreds of miles? Would that cut our cost in half?
Let's say from $15 to $7.50 a day?

That would still be $852,647,567,362 a year. $852 Billion.

But I kinda like the subsidize healthy food idea maybe.... the conspiracy nut in me is now thinking "yeah subsidize only the gmo foods"...

Great thread, even if it doesn't seem so feasible at the current time. All we need to work on is the logistics and efficiency aspect and I think we could cut food prices by a lot.

It seems that if people who were starving gave up on trying to get money to buy food, and supplemented that with the food freely offered by the world it would help. You always see these people just sitting, starving, waiting for someone to come give them a job, when they could be fishing, picking roots berrys nuts, eating bugs, anything to prevent death. Or at the very least stand up and walk somewhere else where there is food.

Though I must note that this is alot easier for me here in the U.S. to say since I haven't to face these realities in my life. Also I am very grateful the things that have been given to me in life, few though they are. But I feel that the best gifts I was given in life were a suitable body, with hands feet eyes ears etc... an intellect, some healthy desires, self control, etc... Point is right here in our own country people end up destitute and willing to do nothing about it, only in this country they don't starve because we feed them. Don't get me wrong on this point either, I'm 100% for feeding the homeless. My point is that the only way to really help people is to get them to start working for themselves, and changing the way they do things.

I think all of us are guilty of waiting for someone else to initiate our own activites. In this life, it seems, we are the initiators, and we must take care of ourselves.

Originally posted by LOLZebra
OK OK OK. After reading everyones post I think I finally figured out a way that would meet OP halfway and not break the bank (40 trillion).

In other countries, such as India, if you travel there, your daily food cost is going to be $1. Unless you are eating a LOT of food then it will be more. In the US though let us keep the $15 a day per person figure.

According to Census.gov there are 311,469,431 People in the U.S.

So that would cost 15 x 311,469,431 x 365 = 1,705,295,134,725

OK So about 1.7 Trillion USD. I don't know about you but $105 a week for food is really high in my opinion. It also depends on the type of food you are eating.

What if we had a program that credited grocery stores for certain food purchases (think healthy) but had no credit or subsidies for junk food.

For example say you go to the grocery store, you buy a bunch of vegetables, and a 2L bottle of soda, and a bag of chips. You would end up paying only for the Soda & Chips but nothing for the veggies as it would be subsidized. Now I can see how this would become a problem, people taking more than they need. So you would need a limit, and probably some government card that keeps that limit in check. You don't want someone going into multiple stores and taking all their bananas, then letting them rot at home because they can't eat them all. ... now that I think about it... this sounds familiar.. close to communism but with a twist.

What if food was grown locally instead of being transported hundreds of miles? Would that cut our cost in half?
Let's say from $15 to $7.50 a day?

That would still be $852,647,567,362 a year. $852 Billion.

But I kinda like the subsidize healthy food idea

maybe.... the conspiracy nut in me is now thinking "yeah subsidize only the gmo foods"...

Great thread, even if it doesn't seem so feasible at the current time. All we need to work on is the logistics and efficiency aspect and I think we could cut food prices by a lot.

This made me imagine this world where theres this high efficiency, corporate machine, that is just dedicated to giving people all the food they want.(the executives and workers are just servant drones ensuring their own destruction) The planet being stripped bare, and all the people getting fatter and fatter dying of diabetes, heart disease, etc...

If you can save the 25,000 deaths per day from hunger that will put extra strain on the already tight budget trying to feed the others?.people dying from hunger is helping your plan work ,the more people dead ,the less eating the food.It's a no win situation and one that can only be solved by mass extinction.Forget the whole idea it,it may have worked before the population went critical,now it's a pipe dream.

reply to post by gimme_some_truth


My Idea is a lot easier, but it requires money.

Instead of Mc Donalds throwing away all of their left overs, they just ship them to hungry nations.

The sad thing is that even if ats found a way, the thread would be gone and forgotten within a couple of days. we discuss and discuss, but all we seem to do is kill time.

A more stable statistic is this.

There are 500,000,000 people in the world that struggle with hunger.

Give each one $30 a week. It could even be $20, as over 1 billion live on less than $2 a day. This would double their money.

Total Cost @ $30 per week = $780 Billion.

Total Cost @ $20 per week = $520 Billion

It's not just a matter of paying for all the food, there's also a problem of distribution.

I recall back around the 80's when Michael Jackson wrote that "We are the World" song and raised so much money for the starving people in Africa -- I think it might have been Ethiopia. We later found out that so much of the food that had been shipped there ended up rotting on the docks. It turned out that the people in charge in that country did not want to give the food to the starving people because those happened to be people that they did not like for some political reason or other.

There is really plenty of food being harvested around the world to feed everyone. We just have to figure out a way (or how to get permission) to get the food to everyone.

It also doesn't help when we get stuck with all sorts of extra regulations like not being able to plow a field because some rare animal is found living there, or being limited in the ability to water the crops because some rare animal is found using the same water source. It seems that these creatures are considered "rare" because they have a new species name (new discoverer) because of a different spot or bump or whatnot without bothering to at least try to interbreed it with the other more common similar species nearby to make sure they aren't just looking at natural variations.

The population of the world was about 1 billion in 1800 and 7 billion today . A 700% increase . Stats are hard to come by between 1800 and 1870 but we know fairly well what the world food , including livestock production was in 1870 and know what it is today . If we make and educated guess for food production between 1800 and 1870 then we can see a 300% increase in agricultural and livestock food production since 1800 . Food production has increased less that 50% of the population increase since 1800 . Just about every place a crop of any kind can be grown , a crop is being grown . China with 4 trillion dollars of forgien currency reserves in the bank , can't feed itself so they buy any and every extra crop grown in Europe and North America . The Chinese just made a deal that starts next year with Canada to harvest 3 million Harp Seals every year , for food back in China . China has factory ships in the North Atlantic around Iceland where they sit and buy every fish that open water fishermen can sell them , for food back in China . That's forcing fish prices way up in Europe . The Russians can't feed themselves and every year they buy 100's of thousands to millions of metric tonnes of grain from the USA and Canada every year , if they can get it before the Chinese do . Giving everyone 15 bucks per day won't do a thing . More agricultural land must be created , but how and where ? It's there but the politics aren't there to cut down forests to feed people . Other than that , crop yields worldwide must be increased substantially . Another solution would be to stop the exponential population growth . With a few social safety nets folks in India and China wouldn't need 5 sons and two daughters to run the farm and provide for the parents in their old age . That's why they have all of those kids now . No draconian mass sterilization or abortion programs required if the older folks had the security of a minimum old age pension and the most populated countries on earth like China and India could afford it . Slow the rate of population growth , increase the amount of agricultural land and increase crop yields . When folks think of China they think rice . China can't come close to growing the rice they need for that population .

I say that to cure world hunger, the Governments need to get together and agree on a set planetary temperature and then set in motion a plan that can alter climate and equalize the consistent and ambient temperature for a favorable agricultural requirements. You know......So we could eventually cultivate corn in the Sahara desert and grow peaches in Greenland.

Originally posted by QuantumPhysicist
You know what, I really like your idea. Normally I really don't care for the "feed the hungry" topics, but you actually have a really good solution.
To bad TPTB would never go for it.
If you know anybody of any power (friend of a politician, mayor, etc) I would say run your idea by them and try to get some things rolling!

That is where most of us make a mistake in reasoning in my humble opinion. It is not the power that be who is in control. It is we the people who are in control of our government. I am willing to bet 1 dollar (only with you !!) that the USA will feed those with hunger for one year if every US citizens demonstrate in front of the white house on the same day.

Originally posted by nerbot
reply to post by gimme_some_truth

 

I understand what you're saying, but I think a hungry person would be happy with just 1 meal a day for starters and it wouldn't have to cost as much as $5.

What's more important is helping the hungry to feed themselves. Giving money to buy food...well, it has to come from somewhere but it is impracticle to do that constantly isn't it so money spent on farming, irrigation and healthcare is much better spent.

Well...you better start talking to TPTB eh?

I cook for the elderly at a nursing home. Know how much scrap we tend to throw away at the end of every day? Uneaten food, unused portions, and the ever-popular past-expiration-but-still-fine scam?

At the end of the day we throw away about 100 pounds of scrap and "expired" food.

36,500 pounds of food a year; Eighteen tons of hamburgers, broiled fish, scalloped potatoes, baked ham, steamed vegetables, pies, cakes, milk, fruit, you name it, it's in there.

There is lots of food to go around in the world. It's just that it's distributed in a hideously uneven way; We in America have an average intake of probably three thousand calories; and for every one and a half calories we eat, we throw one calorie in the garbage. We tend to see food as practically worthless, because it's all around us, all the time. Just where I'm typing here I'm enjoying a pepsi, a breakfast burrito, and will chase it down with a samoa cookie before I head out to work in a kitchen, where I will make sloppy joes, pizza, salad, cake, and ministrone soup for seventy people. Meanwhile some kid in Mali is wishing he had a lentil to suck on.

Yes, improving local agriculture is the long-term goal; But in the meantime, monetary supplementation to buy food would work out just fine.

I hate to bring up a rather unpleasant, heartless point, but you forgot to factor in the birth rate. People in underdeveloped countries have many more children (the average I think is 5 or 6) than wealthier, educated countries. Now, add well fed people in underdeveloped countries and the numbers will skyrocket.

So, you cut our military budget to feed the people of today, but it is a finite solution since even more money will be needed to feed the people of tomorrow.

If solving the world's hunger crisis were the main reason, I would fully support the "Democracy at Gunpoint" analogy.

The reason that countries are poor and hungry are not because they cannot grow food or learn how to farm. It's because their government won't let them and would turn around and sell any crops or goods instead of using for it's people. Hell, we saw that happen in Somalia in the 90s and even as recently in Haiti when good shipped after the disaster would be hijacked by gangs and thugs.