World food prices are rising. Higher food prices help out the farmers, but hurt the consumers. For many consumers even a moderate bump in prices can be devastating. The combination of higher prices with the government subsidization of many of the food products featured in the dollar menus at the fast food shops ends up driving people to eat food that may ultimately be the cause of their death.
Governments in the western world would certainly like their citizens to feel as if they are helping the world’s hungry, but that may just be more hot air. In the January 2009 inauguration speech President Obama promised the poor of the world to “work alongside you to make your farms flourish.” He set up a bureau of food security to back that promise up and convinced other countries to follow suit.
Well, the promised aid has materialized, but in a trickle rather than a torrent. Congress is hewing into the President’s budget, the United States is at a record high deficit spending, and a large part of our workforce cannot find work. Many of the employed are working jobs they are incredibly over qualified for. What are we to do?
We can start by buying local and eating seasonal. We can swear off of the fast foods (the cost of the 1$ burger is much, much higher when the costs of the tax funded subsidies, harmful farming practices, and the health effects are taken into consideration). We can focus on helping the hungry around us. That is the first step. Feed those you can, and feed them well. I am on the fence about GMOs, but if I were starving I would eat a flounder-tomato. If my children were starving I would feed them corn grits made from modified corn. I can afford to eat local food, but what about those who can’t?
Learn to cook real food from scratch. Trade your chicken eggs to your neighbor for her fresh baked bread loaves. Every time you are tempted to buy an “almost” beef taco (the temptations will diminish as you eat more real food) put that dollar in a jar. At the end of the month donate the jar’s content to a local agency that feeds the homeless. Start small. Feed your family well. Hold a monthly soup-a-thon and donate one portion from everyone. Everyone should ask themselves this burning question.
How do we help the hungry?
