Solutions for World Hunger Part I: Follow-up from 21 Days for World Hunger

Now that I have completed my 21 Day experiment for World Hunger including a world hunger diet of one meal a day averaging 988 calories a day, I am prepared to present some ideas for solutions to overcoming world hunger.  This post is Part I of three parts suggesting various solutions including ways to stay informed and ways to take action.

Resurfacing – a Follow-up from 21 Days for World Hunger

Where do I begin?  The last few days have been heavenly, assuming there are hash browns, pizza, chocolate and lots of rest on heaven.  Day 1 of recovery from 21 Days for World Hunger arrived after eight full hours of sleep.  I awoke and set out for breakfast to our favorite little breakfast place, Cliff Café.  I could barely contain myself.  This might sound ludicrous, but I was quivering with joy.  A smile took up permanent residence on my face from the moment we walked in to ordering my favorite tofu veggie scramble with hash browns hold the bread to eating.  I brought along a container and placed about 1/3 of my breakfast in it before I took my first bite.  I could’ve easily eaten the entire meal and am soooo glad I didn’t.  I filled up fast.  I don’t know the number of calories, but I speculate about 1200 – more than I had eaten on most days over the course of three weeks.  And that was the first meal of the day!  It felt like an extravagance.  Our bill was about $16.00 – that’s about what we spent for three days of meals.

Incidentally, after coming to the Cliff Café about once every couple of months for the past couple of years, I finally asked about their tofu.  I had been putting it off, because I was concerned about the answer to this question:  Do you know if your tofu is made with genetically modified soybeans? I was delighted to learn that they buy from a local vendor who only sells to certain restaurants and who grows and hand presses (something like that) organic tofu himself.  It’s like artisan tofu – no wonder it’s so good!  I wish I could remember the name – Clearwater?  In either case, I am now even more loyal to this little restaurant.

Just as I guesstimated, I weighed in at 111.5 pounds on the first post world hunger diet morning – pre breakfast.  That’s a total of 8.5 pounds lost in 21 days.  I am methodically putting some of those pounds back on.  I’m not concerned about where I land, yet I know I don’t want to gain through gorging.  I’ve been keeping myself in check.  I had my leftovers from breakfast later in the afternoon and enjoyed Amy’s Organics Rice Crust Spinach Pizza for dinner. Five pieces.  They were small, really.  I saved three for lunch the next day.  Saturday night I sat down without my computer to watch a movie – it was the first night of non-work in three weeks.  I fell asleep about thirty minutes in.  Go figure.

Needless to say, I spoiled myself for a couple of days.  I ate peanut butter and made hot cocoa.  I added hot cocoa mix to the peanut butter and ate that.  Interestingly enough, on the second day of recovering from those last 21 days, I didn’t eat my first meal until about 1:00 pm.  I simply wasn’t hungry.  Odd.  Also on that second day, I slept ten hours. Fortunately it was a cold, rainy, Sunday.  For me, there’s no better excuse to sleep in than on a cold, rainy weekend day. The husband took care of the dogs, so I knew everyone was okay.  Life felt good.  By the third day I only ate one meal – dinner. I’m still surprised that I wasn’t hungry until dinner!  But now I’m back to my old self eating a little throughout the day sans chocolate.  I’ve already put on 2 pounds and am at about 113.5 and counting.

One other potentially remarkable point:  We have officially gone one full month without needing to take the garbage or recycling to the curb for pickup.  We have a 35 gallon garbage can that is barely 1/3 full and a 64 gallon recycling bin that is about 25% full.  Our decreased food consumption in combination with eating whole foods (bought in bulk) has drastically reduced the amount of waste we create.  Just an interesting little factoid there.

Eliminating Hunger: Staving Off Starvation

When I get really stuck on a problem, I tell myself over and over every problem has a solution.  If I say it enough, I believe it.  Sometimes I go to bed thinking, I’m going to wake up with a solution. It never ceases to surprise me how that intention – more times than not – comes to fruition.  I believe in the vast capacity of the human mind to solve problems.  We have a monumental problem on our hands.  Granted, many people would disagree as evidenced by some of the comments I’ve seen on other sites.  There are folks out there who think:  It’s not my problem.  I have enough to deal with.  Why should I bother?  If these people don’t have the resources to find food, they should just get a job like the rest of us.

If you’ve been reading along these last 21 days, you would see it’s not that simple – not cut and dry.  And surely, assumptions or negative judgments about others’ predicaments do absolutely no good. Open your awareness to the fact that people who want to eat, who want to prosper, are absolutely oppressed; some by their own governments.

Plenty International, a nonprofit with a mission to assist in the protection, stewardship, and sharing of the world’s resources to promote the well being of the communities and environment we share, answered the following question:

What would you say is the number one realistic solution for eliminating world hunger and why?

There needs to be a paradigm shift in the allocation of global resources away from military and defense expenditures…away from war and toward the elimination of poverty which kills 25,000 children every day. Every community deserves primary health care, which includes adequate accessible potable water. As a species we will be able to afford this the instant we eliminated killing each other as an acceptable means of solving our differences. We also have the effects of climate change to deal with. War is no longer an option.

In addition to that, Plenty and every other expert with whom I spoke regarding actions we can take to eliminate world hunger stated, support local (non-industrial) farmers.

Personally, I believe humans have a responsibility to look out for one another.  Not only for karma’s sake (though that could be a motivator) but for the mere fact we are all in this thing together whether or not we’ve chosen to be.  Turning our heads from the suffering of others does not make that pain disappear.

I have pulled together a number of resources collected over the last three-plus weeks.  I intend to continue adding to this as I learn more.  Keeping in mind this is not an all-inclusive list and that I welcome your ideas as well.  For now, the solutions portion of my World Hunger project is divided into three separate posts.  It’s just too much information for one post.  All of that information at once may feel a bit overhwhelming…

Stay Informed

Educate before you demonstrate.  Too many folks are quick to jump on the ‘it’s not my problem because…(rationalizations and excuses)’ bandwagon when it comes to some issues – world hunger included.  Me too…guilty as charged.  I can recall times in which I was spouting off at the mouth with just enough information to be dangerous.  My suggestion for all of us (again, myself included) is to keep an open heart and a wild willingness to hear new information and perspectives regarding the issues of our shared earth.

Below is a collection of sites that can help you learn more about world hunger and the organizations that are working tirelessly to make a difference.

• Food for Life

Food for Life is a nonprofit organization, bringing food and life to the needy of the world through the liberal distribution of pure food prepared with love. The project started in 1974 and today Food for Life is active in over 60 countries worldwide.

• The Small Planet Institute

Supporting grassroots anti-hunger and pro-democracy movements worldwide since 2002.

• The Organic Consumers Association

An online, grassroots nonprofit that supports sustainability and social justice.  You can also check out their organic directory to find organic and other green products and services in your area.  Or you can subscribe to Organic Bytes to receive up-to-date information – it’s been a valuable resource for me.

• Brighter Green

Brighter Green is a non-profit public policy action tank that aims to raise awareness and encourage dialogue on and attention to issues that span the environment, animals, and sustainable development both globally and locally. Brighter Green’s work has a particular focus on equity and rights.

• Earth Island Institute has been very helpful during this project.  For 25 years, Earth Island Institute has been a hub for grassroots campaigns dedicated to conserving, preserving, and restoring the ecosystems on which our civilization depends.

• Check out the Food and Agriculture Organization’s (FAO) report Towards Eliminating Hunger. It’s a part of their The State of Food Insecurity in the World 2009 report.

• Community Food Security Coalition (CFSC)
  Community food security is a condition in which all community residents obtain a safe, culturally acceptable, nutritionally adequate diet through a sustainable food system that maximizes community self-reliance and social justice.

• Food Research Action Center – fighting hunger in America

• Why Hunger – finding answers for hunger and poverty

• An Urban Role-Model:  People’s Grocery in Oakland California

With a mission to build a community food system that improves the health and economy of the West Oakland community, People’s Grocery is doing just that.  They believe in food justice – that everyone deserves access to healthy food regardless of income.  They work with the urban poor to develop programs that produce and distribute fresh produce and fruits.  They provide nutrition education, promote urban agriculture and create local jobs.  Check them out – perhaps you can do the same in your area!

• Coalitions to End Hunger

To learn more about hunger and how to end hunger, check out Second Harvest Food Banks’ Coalitions to End Hunger page.

• You can also learn more about the correlation between health and food at the T. Colin Campbell Foundation.

Stuff to Watch

• Mark Bittman Real Food, Real Simple
  

Video:  What’s Wrong with What We Eat?

Bittman in all his intellectual, articulate and entertaining glory, discusses how the fates of individual people and all of humanity are intertwined.  He discusses how our demand, not our need, for certain foods that are no good for us are the exact contributing issues to our health problems.  The evidence is overwhelmingly clear that plants promote health and we don’t need animal products or junk food for health. Of course this doesn’t mean we don’t need some junk food for comfort – just a thought.  Both are marketed heavily, supported by government agencies and create an unhealthy demand. Basically, those who believe they need these foods are simply buying into sophisticated and cunning marketing schemes.  He discusses the death of family farms and how we arrived at our current state of food production.  He adds how we have less variety of food now that we have moved away from a plant-centric diet and how farm subsidies are contributing to overall problem.

• The Future of Food

This documentary highlights the disturbing changes occurring in the food system.  Watching it will reveal in easy-to-understand and interesting approaches the issues around genetically engineered foods and the corporatization of food. If you want a good grasp on what’s happening to the environment and the skewed ethics of corporations who are gaining momentum on controlling your food, I suggest you watch this movie.

• Food Inc.

Another interesting and informative flick on our nation’s food supply.  Check out their website to learn more about what you can do to take back control of your food, your health and the health of the planet including 10 simple things you can do to change our shared food system.

• Forks over Knives – Coming Summer 2010

From the mastermind behind the movie, Brian Wendel writes, Many of us and our loved ones are medicated, sick and dying prematurely.  Due to skyrocketing health care costs and an aging population, it is burdening our economy in an unsustainable way.  This is arguably the issue of our time.  Yet we have before us what could be a real solution to a real problem—if only we would take it seriously.

In this film, T. Colin Campbell in all his medicinal brilliance shares how humans can turn on and turn off cancer cell growth simply by changing the level of protein in our diets.  This movie shares the research behind reversing your medical diseases.  I recommend this movie only for you folks who care about your health or the health of someone you love.  Otherwise, there’s no need to watch it.

• Capitalism: A Love Story

Okay, I can expect some push-back from recommending this movie.  I know.  I know.  Michael Moore has some radical tendencies. If you can put aside his one-sided approach to movie production and simply listen to the message, this movie has a lot to offer.  It answers how we in the United States arrived at this current place of inequities  – financial crisis and tanked housing market.  And it is entertaining in a sick, messed up sort of way.  He details government actions aligning with corporate interests, bailouts, and who is winning and who is losing.  As usual, it’s the regular everyday folks like you and I that get the big screw.

• War Dance

While this movie does not take a look at hunger in Uganda, it surely focuses on the poverty that has resulted from war in Northern Uganda. The focus is on the amazing children who have suffered at the hands of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) and how they are striving to overcome the harsh reality of unforgivable violence and the absolute pain that accompanies being thrown into a state of fear so immense that they, themselves had to commit violence onto others in order to survive.  I highly recommend this film especially if you don’t understand that some of the causes of poverty have absolutely nothing to do with the people who are living in destitution.

• The Small Planet Institute If you click on the link, you will find a series of informative videos  featuring  Frances Moore Lappé.

Stuff to Read

• Diet for a Small Planet by Frances Moore Lappé.   

• 12 Myths about Hunger by Frances Moore Lappé, Joseph Collins, and Peter Rosset.
• You can find a summary of the 12 Myths at Food First.

• The Food Revolution:  How Your Diet can Help Save Your Life and the World by John Robbins

• Appetite for Profit: How the Food Industry Undermines Our Health and How to Fight Back by Michele Simon, a public health lawyer who has been writing about the food industry since 1996.

• Gristle: From Factory Farms to Food Safety edited by Moby with Miyun Park. An information-packed, lively, and informative little guide, Gristle is for the growing number of people—from omnivores to vegans—who are thinking twice about the consequences of our industrial factory-farming system of raising animals for food.
• For a short time longer, the blog Eat.Drink.Better is offering a Gristle giveaway.

• Dr. T. Colin Campbell in his book The China Study also reveals sound scientific evidence of protein over-consumption and illness along with how the healthiest people on earth consume plant-based diets.  Keeping in mind these folks are consuming the necessary calories to meet their needs.

Teens

Teens are amazing people.  When they support a cause, they do it with a tremendous fervor. Getting teens involved in learning about and taking action on issues like world hunger could be a proactive step towards mitigating this problem.

• Hunger Projects

I have both witnessed and heard from individuals that have engaged in Hunger Projects through their school or youth/extracurricular group.  Part of the Hunger Projects revolve around showing the disparity of eating around the world.  One person reported that during one of these Hunger Projects and at a time of communal eating, the students would be given cards or name tags with the name of a country on it.  Those teens who were given a Western nation card (USA or England, for example) sat at a big table with plenty of room and were given large portions of meat as the main dish with some other vegetable on the side along with a soda to drink and a dessert.

For those teens who received one of the other cards from an African, Asian, and South American nation, they were seated at a smaller table but one that was crowded with more people.  There, they received a small bowl of rice, maybe some lentils, or other grains or beans representing that specific nation’s staple.  The portions would be small – nearly nothing according to American standards. To represent the world more authentically, the majority of cards held the names of countries from the third world.

One of the lessons learned from those experiences was how being born in the right place is a matter of chance.

• Global Citizen Year (GCY)

I’ve had the privilege of working with this organization whose mission is to prepare a new generation of Americans to provide innovative and effective leadership to address the global challenges of the 21^st century.

GCY recruits a diverse corps of high-potential high school graduates, puts them through an intensive training program and supports them through apprenticeships in Asia, Africa, and Latin America during a bridge year between high school and college.

Part of GCY’s vision includes future generations of Americans will better understand that their lives are intimately connected to others across our global community, and will act with conviction and conscience to create a more peaceful and sustainable world.

• 30-Hour Famine

Check out this international youth movement to fight hunger.

But most importantly, we need to expose kids and teens to gardens and growing food.  The satisfaction they feel from growing food can help empower them, can get them grounded (literally and figuratively) and can help them gain an early awareness and relationship with their food.

The next post will outline some specific actions we can all take to help eliminate hunger.

In the end, we will conserve only what we love, we will love only what we understand, and we will understand only what we are taught.
~ Baba Dioum, Senegalese conservationist

To support the organizations I write about in the series, purchase a World Hunger: Be the Solution Tee.  Proceeds from the shirt will go to the Small Planet Institute Fund and the International Fund for Africa.  All tees are sweat free and available in organic cotton.  To see the selection of World Hunger tees at Conducive’s Humanitarian & Human Rights Tee store, click here

To follow this series from the beginning, you can click the links below:

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 1

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 2

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 3

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 4

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 5

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 6

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 7

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 8

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 9

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 10

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 11

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 13

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 14

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 15

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 16

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 17

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 18

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 19

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 20

21 Days for World Hunger: Day 21

Solutions for World Hunger: Part II

Solutions for World hunger: Part III