How to Feed the World

Below, eight leaders in the fight against hunger offer up food crisis action plans, and long term ideas for how to end famine and bolster farming.

NEWSWEEK

From the magazine issue dated May 19, 2008

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Gordon Brown
Prime Minister, United Kingdom
Every day, 25,000 people die from hunger-related causes. And when food accounts for more than half a poor family's spending, price rises can be truly devastating for millions living on the edge.

To find solutions to the short- and long-term problems these families face, I recently hosted a meeting of leading experts, scientists, food producers and retailers in Downing Street.

Already the U.K. has pledged £30 million of immediate support to countries hit hardest by food-price inflation, as well as an additional £25 million to boost incomes.

But what the world really needs is fully coordinated and committed action from the international community—a worldwide response to this unfolding catastrophe. Last month, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon announced a task force to address this at the highest levels of the United Nations, and the World Bank has also pledged support. These are important steps. And I have written to the chair of the G8, Prime MinisterYasuo Fukuda of Japan, asking him to work with the World Bank, the IMF and the U.N. to produce a plan.

We need an agricultural revolution to boost production in the poorest countries. And new research and support for high-yield and climate-resilient crops, as well as a review of bio-fuels to help us understand their impact on food prices and the environment.

We need to secure rapid IMF and World Bank help for countries suffering from the cost of food imports.

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Posted By: smokey_joe @ 05/24/2008 12:30:10 AM

Here's a simple idea to make a dent in hunger in the Philippines that has experienced rice shortages and high prices recently: If the world Bank can set up financing to buy one of those shiny new rice harvesting machines to send to the Philippines and people around the world can contribute a little bit to make the payments for the harvester, then the people in the Philippines can increase their production of rice and lift themselves out of hunger and poverty. If the first machine works well, then more could be bought later. I think the World Bank would like to see everyone's email about that idea.
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Posted By: smokey_joe @ 05/22/2008 6:05:31 PM

The other night I saw a segment of the TV series "Modern Marvels" in which they showed a brand new rice harvesting machine that can harvest tons of rice in muddy fields with only a single driver running the machine. This type of equipment will probably only be available to American farmers for some time to come. But it shows how much America can do to relieve world hunger while earning a decent profit and solving some of our foreign trade deficit problems. I know there are vast tracts of unused land in Florida that would be ideal for this type of agriculture.
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Posted By: smokey_joe @ 05/15/2008 5:59:33 PM

When ethanol from cellulosic biomass and liquid fuel from coal grow in production volume and vehicles are running on $1.00 per gallon fuel, then food prices will drop and food production will increase because of the reduction in cost to run all the farm machines that plant, fertilize, irrigate, harvest and transport food crops to the marketplace.