1 Billion Hungry People

“World hunger reaches the 1 billion people mark
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090619/ap_on_re_eu/eu_un_world_hunger
By ALESSANDRA RIZZO, Associated Press Writer Alessandra Rizzo, Associated Press Writer – 1 hr 16 mins ago
ROME – One in six people in the world — or more than 1 billion — is now hungry, a historic high due largely to the global economic crisis and stubbornly high food prices, a U.N. agency said Friday.
Compared with last year, there are 100 million more people who are hungry, meaning they receive fewer than 1,800 calories a day, the Food and Agriculture Organization said in a report.
Almost all the world's undernourished live in developing countries, where food prices have fallen more slowly than in the richer nations, the report said. Poor countries need more aid and agricultural investment to cope, it said.
"The silent hunger crisis, affecting one-sixth of all of humanity, poses a serious risk for world peace and security," said the agency's Director-General Jacques Diouf.
Soaring prices for staples, such as rice, triggered riots in the developing world last year.
Hunger increased despite strong 2009 cereal production, and a mild retreat in food prices from the highs of mid-2008. However, average prices at the end of last year were still 24 percent higher in real terms than in 2006, FAO said.
The global economic crisis has compounded the problem for people dealing with pay cuts or job losses. Individual countries have also some lost flexibility in handling price fluctuations, as the crisis has made tools such as currency devaluation less effective.
The report predicted the urban poor would likely be hit hardest as foreign investment declines and demand for exports drops, and that millions would return to the countryside, which in turn could put pressure on rural communities and resources.
Globally there are now about 1.02 billion people hungry, up 11 percent from last year's 915 million, the agency said. It based its estimate on analysis by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Asia and the Pacific, the world's most populous region, has the largest number of hungry people at 642 million.
Sub-Saharan Africa has the highest hunger rate, with 265 million undernourished representing 32 percent of the region's population.
In the developed world, undernourishment is a growing concern, with 15 million now hungry, the report said.
The crisis also affects the quality of nutrition, as families tend to buy cheaper foods, such as grains, which are rich in calories but contain fewer proteins than meat or dairy products.
Diouf urged governments to immediately set up social protection programs to improve food access for those in need. He said small farmers should be helped with seeds, tools and fertilizers.
He urged structural, long-term changes, such as increasing production in low-income countries, noting that world hunger had been increasing before the financial downturn.”

Lower-priced sustainable energy will help people everywhere so that they can use the money they don't have to spend on energy for irrigation, clean water, manufacturing, etc. We can help with this: please see www.terrahumanafoundation.org.

More on Climate and Health

"Climate 'biggest health threat'
Climate change is "the biggest global health threat of the 21st Century", according to a leading medical journal.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8049061.stm
The Lancet, together with University College London researchers, has published a report outlining how public health services will need to adapt.
It also highlights the consequences of climate-related mass migrations.
The authors aim to add their voice to the call for carbon mitigation and will focus on making clear the ways in which climate change will affect health.
University College London (UCL) climatologist Mark Maslin called it "the Stern report for medics", referring to the 2006 review that outlined the future impacts of the climate change situation in economic terms and advocated comprehensive, early-stage action to address it.
"The medical profession has to wake up if we're going to save billions of lives. This is why it's in the Lancet - it is the only way to do this is working with medics and other professionals to get that message across," Professor Maslin said. *****Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/8049061.stm
Published: 2009/05/14 10:14:10 GMT
© BBC MMIX"
Yes. The medical profession needs to pay attention. But we all need to pay attention. And we can wake up now, do something now, to save lives. Wecan call for across-the-board alternative energy use, and to find out how, please see www.campaignforgreen.

Climate Change and Climate Disasters

"Oxfam warns of climate disasters http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8009412.stm
The number of people hit by climate-related disasters is expected to rise by about 50%, to reach 375m a year by 2015, the UK-based charity Oxfam says.
Current humanitarian systems are barely able to cope, an Oxfam study contends.
It warns agencies are in danger of being overwhelmed by events such as flooding, storms and drought.
*****Oxfam is also calling for a greater focus on helping countries and communities to prevent, and prepare for the suffering that climate change will cause.
*****
Published: 2009/04/21 00:44:32 GMT
© BBC MMIX"
Something can be done now to stave off any more climate change caused by global warming. For more information, please see www.campaignforgreen.com.

Earth, Breath, Trees

"A major Science study published in January found widespread increase in tree mortality rates in the western U.S., thanks in part to regional warming trends and growing water scarcity. Another study published last month, also in Science, found that even the seemingly limitless Amazon rainforest could be highly vulnerable to drought. And since living trees suck up CO2 from the atmosphere, massive tree mortality due to warming could produce a feedback effect, further intensifying climate change. In the end, we might need a bigger Biosphere 2, because we're on track to screw up Biosphere 1 — otherwise known as the Earth" (http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1891121,00.html
Tuesday, Apr. 14, 2009,The Dire Fate of Forests in a Warmer World
By Bryan Walsh).

Trees help the earth breathe. We need to do something. And we can. For more information, please see www.campaignforgreen.com.

Australia -- Just One Example

"http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-climate-change-australia9-2009apr09,0,65585.story?page=3
What will global warming look like? Scientists point to Australia
April 9 2009
By Julie Cart
April 9, 2009
Reporting from The Murray-Darling Basin, Australia -- Frank Eddy pulled off his dusty boots and slid into a chair, taking his place at the dining room table where most of the critical family issues are hashed out. Spreading hands as dry and cracked as the orchards he tends, the stout man his mates call Tank explained what damage a decade of drought has done .
"Suicide is high. Depression is huge. Families are breaking up. It's devastation," he said, shaking his head. "I've got a neighbor in terrible trouble. Found him in the paddock, sitting in his [truck], crying his eyes out. Grown men -- big, strong grown men. We're holding on by the skin of our teeth. It's desperate times."
"You'd have to have your head in the bloody sand to think otherwise," Eddy said.
They call Australia the Lucky Country, with good reason. Generations of hardy castoffs tamed the world's driest inhabited continent, created a robust economy and cultivated an image of irresistibly resilient people who can't be held down. Australia exports itself as a place of captivating landscapes, brilliant sunshine, glittering beaches and an enviable lifestyle.
Look again. Climate scientists say Australia -- beset by prolonged drought and deadly bush fires in the south, monsoon flooding and mosquito-borne fevers in the north, widespread wildlife decline, economic collapse in agriculture and killer heat waves -- epitomizes the "accelerated climate crisis" that global warming models have forecast.
With few skeptics among them, Australians appear to be coming to an awakening: Adapt to a rapidly shifting climate, and soon. Scientists here warn that the experience of this island continent is an early cautionary tale for the rest of the world.
"Australia is the harbinger of change," said paleontologist Tim Flannery, Australia's most vocal climate change prophet. "The problems for us are going to be greater. The cost to Australia from climate change is going to be greater than for any developed country. We are already starting to see it. It's tearing apart the life-support system that gives us this world.""

And that's just one example. We've got to do something to end global warming, end the destruction, end the suffering. And we can do something: please see www.campaignforgreen.org.

Water Conservation and Energy

We use up water in clothes, food, and energy production, and have a water footprint just like a carbon footprint (Alter, Alexandra, Yet Another 'Footprint' to Worry About: Water Taking a Cue From Carbon Tracking, Companies and Conservationists Tally Hidden Sources of Consumption” FEBRUARY 17, 2009 The Wall Street Journal, page A11). This is just as important as carbon consumption concerns because of the danger of water shortages from depletion and pollution of groundwater reserves, shrinking of glaciers that provide fresh water, and growing energy and food demand all over the world (Alter, page A11). There are also droughts; Argentina has been suffering under a drought that has dried up rivers and hurt agriculture, particularly the cattle industry so much that for the past two years, ranchers are being forced to sell cattle that are too thin to reproduce and thus replenish the herds (Piette, Candace, “Drought sucks life from Argentina's farms, BBC News, Buenos Aires http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/americas/7905357.stm, Published: 2009/02/23 12:47:33 GMT, © BBC MMIX).

If water wasn't necessary for manufacturing or energy production in general, there would be more water to help people who live in drought-plagued areas. And that's just one way to help when people need water--we could use clean energy to pipe water to people who need it all the time, not just when there's a drought. For more information, please see www.campaignforgreen.com.