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Recommended: Origins of the potato famine
What does famine mean? It is a situation in which people do not have enough food, according to Webster’s New World Dictionary. The great potato famine, however, was far more than just a lack of food. Its effects were felt around the world due to environmental conditions, agriculture practices and economic and political factors (Japikse, 1994). Famine still exists in today’s society, as does the potato blight from the largest crop manufacturers to the small family gardens in Wisconsin, but nothing comes close to the disaster experienced by the Irish. It was the injustices that caused the famine, Gorta Mor, The Great Hunger of 1845-52, as called by the Irish (Daly, 1996). The potato famine of 1846 was one of the biggest natural disasters in Irish history. The “explosive disease” said William Fry, Ph.D., caused by Phytophtera infestans, is a condition that prevents growth and destroys the plant by disease. P. infestans is a fungus-like pathogen that infects and destroys the leaves, stems, potato seed and the potato itself, turning it black and slimy (Craig, 1998). The first signs of blight are when leaves get brown specks on them that start to get white, hairy growth around them (Damsker, n.d.). In addition, leaves and stems withered very quickly. This if followed by a terrible smell. It spreads as a spore and grows rapidly in moist, warm and humid conditions. Today, the blight disease still affects potato crops. However, an application of the plant fungicide, metalaxyl, or copper sulfate mixtures and pesticide will prevent and eliminate or, at least, decrease the possibility of its appearance (Daly, 1996). In fact, according to Gibbon’s article in 2013, the pathogen and its host of dried leaves ar... ... middle of paper ... ...Irish and British people had bitter feelings towards one another. Many Irish were angry the English government did next to nothing to prevent the famine. Then when it happened the government turned their heads. The anger caused a rebellion in 1848 by a group called the Young Ireland party, saying Ireland wanted its own government (Results of the Great Famine, 2014). In conclusion, famine is still a part of the world today, but Gorta Mor of this level of devastation does not occur anymore. The same issues of environment, agriculture practices, economic and political factors are still part of famine today along with the appearance of the potato blight, too. Truth be told, the difference between then and now, however, is that technology is the medium to deliver images and descriptions faster and quicker so as to not let such devastation be experienced.
The relationship between Ireland and England played a major role in the causes of the Great Famine. Ireland became part of the United Kingdom in 1801 due to the Act of Union (Edwards & Williams 19). Under this act, Ireland was placed under "the jurisdiction of the richest and most industrially advanced empire in the world" (Kinealy 33). From this act, Ireland's parliament was abolished and became controlled by England through political leadership established throughout the Irish state. A...
Ireland is a beautiful country in Europe, about the size of Maine. Today, Ireland is mostly populated with middle-class families. Irish is famous for its potatoes, but in 1845 a disease attacked the potato crops. The potatoes were what most of the Irish families lived on. They ate and sold potatoes in order to make a living, so when the potatoes stopped growing, people ran out of money. This is known as "The Great Potato Famine". It was so bad; people were actually starving to death. Two million people died. There was almost no help from the British government. Often people rebelled against the government, angered by its carelessness. Many people didn't want to leave their beloved country, afraid of change. With no food to eat, emigration seemed to be the only solution for most of the population. People often talked about "streets paved with gold" in a country called America. There was said to be many job opportunities in this new country. America seemed like the best choice to settle down and finally start a new life.
Many Irish peasants were forced to deal with the hardship of the Irish potato famine from about 1845-1850. Said famine wiped out roughly the entire potato crop in Ireland, thus causing much of the Irish population to decrease by about one quarter. The English who did little to help despite their leadership position indirectly fueled the famine. Prior conflicts between the Irish Catholics, and British Protestants continued to make matters worse, until the end of the famine in about 1850. During 1845, the Irish people were plagued by a fungal epidemic in their potato crop. Due to the past cultural conflicts the British government took no action, and this eventually led to the emigration and death of hundreds of Irish Catholics.
The Great Irish Potato Famine was during a period of mass starvation, disease and emigration through 1845-1850. According to the journal, “The Context of Migration: The Example of Ireland in the Nineteenth Century” by James H. Johnson, this caused the population of Ireland to decrease 20-25% and it did not stabilize again until the 1930’s. Although there was a potato crop failure in Europe in the 1840’s, one third of the Irish population was dependent on this crop. This was inevitable due to the sole dependency of the Irish people on home-grown potatoes and the population almost doubling from 1800 - 1840. The journal, “Spaces for Famine: A Comparative Analysis in Ireland and the Highlands in the 1840’s” by Liz Young states that “if the crop was poor or failed, families could not manage and to compare, 50,000 people died when crops failed in 1817-1819.” The Irish people could not sustain could not sustain their diet of potatoes because they had not the means to buy more seed or, indeed, purchase the land on which to grow enough potatoes to feed their rapidly multiplying families for a year. As families increased in size, their excess produce, that previously would have given them a means to purchase livestock etc., was consumed. There were many factors that were involved in this catastrophe. The main causes were environmental conditions, agricultural practices and climate conditions, economic faults, and social and political trends. Social unrest and the history of Irish poverty was the direct cause of the Irish Potato Famine and the sole dependency on the potato crop which inevitably led them to starvation.
During 1845-1846 events in Ireland would change the lives of many. The Great Potato Famine was a major incident that shocked the entire world. This incident was cause by a disease that traveled from ships overseas. The Great Potato Famine affected one of the biggest crops at the time, which was the potato. Many people got sick from this disease otherwise known as, Phytophthora Infestins. Phytophthora Infestins killed about 1 million people in Ireland.
The Great Potato Famine was a problem that did not only cause starvation and disease but a drop in the economy. Known as the greatest epidemic of the 19th century the Potato Famine will have forever made an impact on Ireland. The Irish were damned from the start with little to no assistance from England with the exception of what they could get for themselves. With laws restricting the grain trade and no regulation on other goods Ireland had no fighting chance to make a turn around. With England living off of the principle “Irish property must pay for Irish poverty” Ireland was in need of outside assistance and that is exactly what many countries came to do.
The Great Potato Famine was an event that drastically affected the lives of the Irish in a bad way. This paper has explained this to you. The potato has evolved and has come a long way it came from 500 B.C. and still exists today. Ireland has went through a rough time from dealing with a trying to get their independence and supporting the Irish people and the English people. This was all happening while the potato blight was happening causing the death of many people and the migration of many others. This was a bad time and now you know why it was a terrible time for the Irish people.
Beginning in 1845 and lasting until 1861 the Great Potato Famine of Ireland killed over a million people, and causing another million to leave the country. The famine began in September 1845 as leaves on potatoes suddenly turned black and curled, then rotted. The cause was an airborne fungus (phytophthora infestants) originally transported by ships traveling from North America to England. Many other factors contributed to this devastation.
The Great Famine of 1845 lasted for many years in Ireland. During this time, many people of Ireland suffered in numerous ways. In such devastating and dark times “deaths began to mount and tragic horrific scenes ensured all over Ireland: Mass Graves, Corpses gnawed by rats, hunger marches, and roadside deaths” (Kelley 137). In these grey times for Ireland, the country battled many hardships to overcome this era. The Great Famine was historically dated from 1845-1851, although the effects of the Famine lasted until 1852 (Kelley 136). The major cause of the Famine was a disease called the blight, but there were many other aspects that caused the catastrophe in Ireland.
Throughout Irish history, its people have been the victims of famine under English rule. Like a boxer with both arms tied behind his back, the Irish could only stand and absorb blow after blow and while it took many circumstances of British and Irish policy to create the knockout punch in 1845, it is clear the social and land divisions as well and economic structures inevitably led to the devastation of the Great Famine.
World hunger is a struggle that has been battled for hundreds of years. Dosomething.org reports that overall, there are over 805 million people experiencing world hunger, which
The disease was brought to Europe and spread around the world via soil plagued with the pathogen and infected potatoes. The first documented case of potato wart in North America was in Newfoundland, Canada over 100 years ago. This occurred due to the importation of diseased potatoes. After the incident in Canada, potato wart surfaced in the U.S. about 4 years later. Similarly, this also occurred due to the importation of approximately 60 million pounds of potatoes from Europe (1). Because of this, North America imposed a ban on potatoes coming from Europe, predominantly from the United Kingdom causing a loss of £1 million or approximately $2 million CAD in today’s value and a decrease in exports by 20% (2). Potato wart disease can cause losses over 50% in contaminated fields. Since then, there have been documented cases of potato wart on every continent. Most often the cases are isolated to small gardens (1, 2).
... then five more, one after another… they allowed themselves to eat those bodies… They said, ‘it was the great unbearable famine that did it.’” The struggle to find food was real. It was a heavy burden for people to bear. The need to stay a live became a daily struggle many civilian and soldiers.
Empirics have shown that famines could thrive even without a general decline in food availability. Even in other cases, starvation has several other variables apart from food availability. FAD approach, which is a food centric view, provides very less idea about the causal mechanism of starvation. It is a gross concept which cannot be applied to the population as a whole. It is not possible for the food supply to fall behind population growth for the world as a whole. Entitlement Approach concentrates on the ability of different sections of the population to have a command over food with the entitlement relations of that society. The latter approach requires use of categories based on certain discriminations. ‘Poor’ as a category is not suitable for causal analysis or evaluative exercises as it can distort public policy. A market economy is characterized by a price for every good or service and every player owns some goods or services. People will starve when their entitlement is not sufficient to buy the food for survival. The food available to them makes a connection with their income distribution and exchange process. The supply of food is not considered to be irrelevant. A decrease in the supply of food will increase its price which decreases the ability to buy food by using their entitlement and may drive to starvation if on the margins of hunger. The
There have been many famines where millions have starved to death. The Ukraine suffered a man made famine less than seventy five years ago where over a million died of hunger.