One Billion Go Hungry (Per U.N.) -- Nick Pell

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December 19, 2009

The UN reported that 1 billion people world wide are currently going hungry. This is the largest number of hungry people ever, up sharply from 2008. There is no food shortage. Natural disasters and local famines account for a tiny minority of the world's hunger. Indeed, we live at a point in history where the world produces more than enough food to feed everyone, and global caloric production is actually up. The cause of hunger, almost throughout the entire world is not a lack of resources. Hunger and starvation exist because food is distributed for the personal profit of the global elite.

The world's food production is increasingly in the hands of global agribusiness. The largest commercial producers of food have as their primary motive the creation of profits for stockholders rather than the feeding of human beings. This is not an abstract question. Because there is ample evidence that these companies don't give a shit about the proles.

It is also worth noting that these companies have been making a drive in the last few years to copyright plants. In the third world this has already amounted to companies trying to force farmers to buy genetically modified (and thus, patented) seeds. The food is then sold at grossly inflated prices. In the United States the percentage of food consumed that is patented will probably shock you. While the situation is not as bad as say, Mexico guess where you're about to be living.