It is now common knowledge that up to 1.4 billion people in the world live below the poverty line. Over 500 million go hungry, according to the UN, and every single day 40,000 children die as a result of hunger.
Why do people go hungry?
Is it because there is not enough food? No, the world produces enough food to give every person on Earth 3000 calories a day.
Is it because of too many people? No, Holland has 1078 people per square mile while Brazil, where ten of thousands go hungry, has 39 people per square mile.
The developed countries comprising 30 percent of the world’s population consume over 80 percent of the resources, not because they need to—the UK alone swallows over £500 million worth of slimming aids every year. Developing countries have been forced to grow more cash crops for export. Consequently, land that should be feeding their people is producing for European and North American markets.
It is in fact the World Market that rules the world. Acting like a natural force beyond human control, it has much more power than any national government and forces governments to comply with its economic laws, whether they want to or not.
The market creates an artificial scarcity and organised waste that is responsible for poverty and hunger in the world today. The law which governs production everywhere is “no profit, no production”.
World malnutrition and starvation, then, is not a natural but a social problem. Its cause must be sought not in any lack of natural resources but in the way society is organised.
Michael Ghebre
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