Dragom Dragom:
Hunger and poverty... Thats the problem?
People are leaving pathetic little dirt farming villages to live in the city.
They register as poor and hungry now because they register at all.
And because they are leaving the village now children are a burden and not a handy source of cheap labour. So now they will have less children.
The problem that solves its self is no problem at all.
Not quite. The reason people are stopping farming and heading into the city is because there is a better opportunity for money and hence food there. People respond to incentives, and many feel life in the city will be better (meaning less food is made because it simply is not profitable for these people to do so). That they remain there rather than return to the farm and these cities in the developing world keep on growing and growing means that these people are getting more out of the cities, but remain in the same poverty cycle as they did as rural dwellers.
These poverty cycles tend to have many children in them because these children are the chief form of insurance the parents have to be fed, clothed and cared for later in life, should they live long enough for that chance. They do not have the security of pensions of rich children who can take them to a home or anything, so many have as many children as possible to ensure that they have a chance at being cared for, and other children they have also get a good chance to survive. Even one or two children rather than zero could be considered too many by your standards. The population continues to grow, and the food supplies going into the city continue to get strained, and the rural areas continue to get strained. Things get worse, not better.
It’s one of those fun little backwards-forwards things in economics, and one of the reasons why modern economists tend not to agree with neo-malthusians – he was wrong once about this, and evidence shows that his theories are still wrong – the richer you get, the less children you have. That is why so many of our countries are at or below the natural rate of replacement (2.1 children per woman) in the developed nation while Africa, parts of Asia and parts of South America continue to experience population booms.
$1:
I know it goes against the grain of basic economics, but many of these "starving" countries actually have ample food and arable land, to their detriment they choose to compete with Europe's heavily subsidized farms.
I’d not so much say “choose” as “forced” (I agree though), and I’d say us in the developed nations have done more damage than anything by subsidizing like crazy. We force our own citizens to pay a ton for food bills and at the same time don’t buy at a good rate from these nations which could still farm at a decent rate. Farm subsidies are probably the largest example of deadweight loss in the modern economic system. The best example is actually the sugar trade down in the States, which ended up coming back and biting Canada in the butt when everyone began moving candy companies to Canada and they slapped heavy tariffs on those in response.
One of the best things Canada can do is reduce its agricultural subsidies on goods with nations which are willing and able to trade food – Chile, for example, has an ample fruit market and could do wonders to both our economy and theirs by getting some subsidies removed. While I doubt we will ever see them all removed (nor do I think it’d be beneficial to all Canadians to remove any subsidies) even in the long run for many years with a wider group of developing countries, even reducing it to a few would be great for those nations who can get around the subsidy blockade we have flung up around our borders. Kudos to Harper on working towards the FTAs in South and Central America which will hopefully help in a similar manner, as a side mention. Whether or not you dislike the conservatives, this was a beneficial move for both Canada and a few trading partners.
With viable investment, capital and incentive, it would improve global food stores and return some profitability to the farmers in developing nations, perhaps fighting off the mega-city problem I mentioned earlier.
$1:
They need to stop listening to Europe and subsidize their own farmers.
The ones under UN aid too, or the ones with the governments which cannot adequately govern at that level. The fun part is, if you made a Venn diagram of those variables you’d have a very big circle with two small bumps on the side.
$1:
Most of these people need to stop worrying what Europe and America have to say. Especially Europe, which is heavily reliant on 3rd world countries for many of its resources, they should be the ones at the mercy of these meetings not the other way round.
Yes! In the Doha talks, this was a big thing and something the developing nations made a stink about and is also something the developed nations, especially the EU, refused the budge on. The states also demanded a more international form of the intellectual rights set up they have, which would also be detrimental to growth in these nations at this point.
$1:
Family-owned farms are a wonderful thing, but they are not at all more efficient than the big farms. It's the economics of scale that make the big farms far more effcient and that's why the family farm is fading before the corporate farm. I do not celebrate this fact and I personally prefer food from small farms in my area, but the reality is that the big firms can outcompete the small ones.
Quite. These days, you need several hundred acres to run a successful farm, and a lot of family farms simply do not meet that criterion. This is compensated by the subsidies and various agricultural boards ensuring prices. Like Bart, I do prefer the family farm (and I think some areas like the Okanagan will more easily endure changing times) and dislike the fact that this is happening, but the model a lot of farmer’s work on simply isn’t as successful anymore.
$1:
I believe the Green Revolution can continue and expand if it's adjusted to meet new conditions.
$1:
One of the biggest reasons many of these poor countries can't grow enough food is because they don't have enough water.
From two different authors, but I was going to ramble about both anyways...
The Green revolution was awesome to have but it’s pace has severely slowed and it doesn’t help that the goods involved chiefly in this revolution – rice, wheat, and the like – are all water intensive, and as bootlegga says, that is an increasing problem. A news article from a few months ago talked about saline being dredged up in part of India due to the lateness of the monsoons, and that many people were getting very defensive over their water supplies. While it would be great to see it go further (and I sincerely hope it does) I hope the direction changes a wee bit in some regards.
CKA Moderator 
CKA Uber 
Forum Addict 
