Food Shortage Over The Past Decades: an Opinion Piece

One of the most complex issues in the world today concerns human population. The number of people living off the earth's resources and stressing its ecosystem has doubled in just forty years. In 1960, there were 3 billion of us; today there are 6 billion. We have no idea what maximum number of people the earth will support. Therefore, the very first question that comes into people's mind is whether there will be enough food for all of us in the future. Unfortunately, there is no definitive answer to that. Food shortage has become a serious problem among many countries around the world. There are numerous reasons why people are starving globally. The lack of economic justice and water shortages are merely two examples among many others.

A Perspective on Food Scarcity in Recent Decades

Danielle Knight (2000) stated that the true source of world hunger is not scarcity but policy; not inevitability but politics. The real culprits are economies that fail to offer everyone opportunities, and societies that place economic efficiency over compassion. The author suggests that, fundamentally, world hunger is mainly caused by us humans. According to the report "World Hunger: Twelve Myths" (Lappé et al., 1998), the world is providing more than enough food for each and every one of us on earth. The problem is that many people living in third-world countries do not have the financial means to pay for readily available food. Even if their country has excess food, they still go hungry due to poverty.

Since people mistakenly believe scarcity is the real cause of this problem, governments and institutions are attempting to solve food shortage issues by increasing food production, despite there being an excess of food in some countries. Although the Green Revolution was a significant global success, hunger still exists in some regions. As Knight (2000) stated, "Large farms, free-markets, free trade, and more aid from industrialized countries have all been falsely touted as the cure to end hunger." These measures promote exports and food production but do not increase the poor's ability to buy food. What the government really should do is balance the economy and enable more people to earn money to purchase food.

Water Scarcity and Food Production

Sandra Postel (1999), on the other hand, has a different perspective than Danielle Knight. She proposed that without increasing water productivity in irrigation, major food-producing regions will not have enough water to sustain crop production. A substantial portion of the world’s food comes from irrigated cropland. The productivity of irrigation is in jeopardy due to the over-pumping of groundwater, according to Postel. There is an annual water deficit of approximately 160 billion cubic meters, the amount used to produce nearly 10 percent of the world’s grain. If we over-pump groundwater, the wells will eventually dry up, making it too expensive to pump from greater depths.

The problem of water shortage will only worsen as the population grows. Already, many countries are suffering from insufficient water to meet domestic demands for food, creating a source of potential political instability, Postel noted. She also stated that governments aren’t doing enough to resolve this food shortage issue. There is no treaty among all the parties that sets out how river water should be shared. In the absence of water-sharing agreements, tensions are bound to rise (Postel, 1999). Postel's solution to this problem is the "Blue Revolution." Most farmers today irrigate the way their predecessors did hundreds of years ago. We need to boost our water productivity through newer technologies and better management of water. The inefficient use of water by people will eventually lead to more severe problems in the future.

Conclusion

Danielle Knight proposed that economic policies should be changed to reduce poverty, which would ultimately improve the condition of world hunger. Sandra Postel, in contrast, proposed a method called the Blue Revolution, which aims to boost water productivity in some major river-flowing countries. Both authors agree that government policy is a significant factor in this problem. Their methods are practical if people around the world work together as a whole. Nothing can be achieved if selfishness prevails. People should unite to address this problem instead of ignoring it as if it’s none of their business. If we can achieve this, the issue of food shortage should improve as we move into the future.

References:

• Knight, D. (2000). The True Source of World Hunger. World Hunger Notes.
• Lappé, F. M., Collins, J., & Rosset, P. (1998). World Hunger: Twelve Myths. Grove Press.
• Postel, S. (1999). Pillar of Sand: Can the Irrigation Miracle Last? W.W. Norton & Company.