Critical Analysis on Chapter 7, State of the World 1999
Feeding Nine Billion
While reading chapter 7 of State of the World I was very interested in the changing course because it made me think about the things that our world can do that can drastically benefit the future of our agricultural production and food prospect. We must be able to solve the two major food issues currently facing our world, which are malnutrition and price stability. All governments need to establish a population policy so that their country does not exceed the limitations of its carrying capacity. It is important that we can produce enough food for our country, which is estimated to increase by 74 million in the next fifty years.
A quote from the book, “The worst mistake political leaders can make entering the new millennium is to underestimate the dimensions of the food challenge”. I certainly agree with this because most of the future food growth in the world is going to be croplands and we need to understand that we are going to need to be able to produce as much crop as possible for the land. I also agree with the fact that the governments that are experiencing rapid population growth must figure out their future population carrying capacity by calculating how much land is available for crops and how much water is available for irrigation.
It is estimated that 3.3 billion more people will be living on this world in the first half of the next century and unfortunately many of those people will be born into already over populated countries. For example, India with some of the highest poverty rates in the world will have an additional 600 million people inhabiting the country by the year 2050.
It was interesting to learn that educating young females would be a good way to control future population growth because “the more education that women have, the fewer children that women have”. Another way to ensure food supply in the future according to the book is to eat food in moderation to keeping a healthy diet, which helps conserve food, and at the same time keeps you healthy. I definitely do not agree with this approach because even though it would work with everyone’s cooperation, you are not going to get everyone’s cooperation because there are still all those people who love to eat and they don’t care if they are overweight or obese.
In the Introduction, Patel outlines some of the major issues he addresses in the ten chapters of his book. The most important of them being: the abundance of food in the world vs. the starvation that is evident in countries such as India and Mexico, reduced prices on crops and how farmers compensate by working harder and producing more, and how the number of people involved in the food economy is gargantuan compared to the number of people who actually make decisions and control what happens in our global food system.
United Nations News Centre, 2014, ‘World population projected to reach 9.6 billion by 2050’, UN report, accessed 21/01/2014.
...ction thus elimination world hunger. Argued by the author of Life on Earth is Getting Better, Not Worse, Julian Simon claims the per person food production in the world in up over the last 30 years because of advances in technology. It is thought that as long as technology can keep up with the world’s population there will be no fear of over-population. It is thought that the long-run overview of the world is one of a more pleasurable, material life rather than one increased with scarcity (Simon, 415).
The Neo-Malthusian dilemma is the worry that our food stocks will not match the population growth leading to famine and disease. This is a growing concern since our population is quickly increasing, we are not bringing new land under cultivation, and we are damaging the environment that is producing our food and sustaining our people. Between 1999 and 2011, the world population increased by one billion, Middleton(2013) noted that it took until 1804 for the world to reach its first billion. The population growth we have exhibited is exponential, and it is only scheduled to peak some time between 2050 and 21003 . Many countries are still expected to go through major population growth. We constantly hear about China and India but Africa is expected to overtake them both by 2050 and make up 23% of the global population4.These large populaces depend on land to grow their food. Urbanization is transforming some farmland into urban areas, like in China for example5 .This land is no longer being used for farming. Until the 1950s, we were able to develop new land for cultivation and thus produce more food, but since then we’ve had no new land to
In order to promote sustainable policy, there must be an incentive to implement change. If any part of the food chain (i.e. producers, suppliers, processors, etc.) cannot keep up with the public demand of food, the food system is unproductive. Although progressive policy might possess the correct intentions, it must be physically and economically feasible. Ironically, contemporary food systems already produce mass amounts of food, but have zero nutritional value or are quite expensive. As a result, we see a dichotomy between production and consumption; both are issues that are addressed by the food policy initiatives in the last section. However, critiques of policy change would argue that our food system is too entrenched in mass production
Malthus believed that population grows geometrically, whereas food supply to support the population grows arithmetically. Therefore, he predicted that the food supply would not be a sufficient amount to support the population which constantly doubles in its cycle. Once Malthus came to this realization, he predicte...
severe increase in the size of the population can cause a shortage of food for
In order for us to maintain our lives, we need to consume food to supply nutrient-needs for our bodies. As the global population increased, the demand for food also increased. Increased population led to mass production of foods. However, even with this mass production, in under-developed countries, people are still undernourished. On other hand, in developed and developing countries, people are overfed and suffering from obesity. In addition, the current methods of industrial farming destroy the environment. These problems raised a question to our global food system. Will it be able to sustain our increasing global population and the earth? With this question in my mind, I decided to investigate the sustainability of our current global food system.
The United Nations Population Division estimates that the human population will number six billion on October 12th, 2000. For those of us born approximately a quarter-century ago, that colossal number is two billion more than the four billion that inhabited the Earth when we entered it. Moreover, it represents a doubling of the population in less than forty years.
As of October 1999', the world obtained 6 billion people. Predictions have been made that by the year 2075' there will be 12 billion people. The major question asked by concerned people is "Is our planet able to provide a healthy and prosperous life style, which we are all a custom to, and can it, be for twice as many people in the future?" "If not, what measures can be taken to prevent such population growth?" "If the United States does take precautions, will these measures be fair, just, and not interfere with natural human rights?"
In the past ten years the world population exceeded six billion people with most of the growth occurring in the poorest, least developed countries in the world. The rapidly increasing population and the quickly declining amount of land are relative and the rate at which hunger is increasing rises with each passing year. We cannot afford to continue to expand our world population at such an alarming rate, for already we are suffering the consequences. Hunger has been a problem for our world for thousands of years. But now that we have the technology and knowledge to stamp it out, time is running short.
Food is one of the essentials of life, it is not something that we can choose to eat or not; but rather something we need in order to produce energy and survive. Not only is food essential but also sparse. Until the introduction of large scale agriculture food was something which people needed to forage and hunt. Lack of food has been a source for wars, famine, and starvation; all things we as human beings should strive to avoid.
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 that are there enough food for all of us in the future? There is no answer for that. Food shortage has become a serious problem among many countries around the world. There are many different reasons why people are starving all over the world. The lack of economic justice and water shortages are just merely two examples out of them all.
This can not be done with the same ineffective tactics that were used in the past, so that’s why people are developing new ways to eradicate hunger. When the Second International Conference on Nutrition (ICN2) was held, they discussed the nutrition component and how important it is that it is not overlooked. By paying attention to nutrient-dense foods and recognizing the different entry points for improving nutrition, the ICN2 argues the world will be one step closer in achieving the Sustainable Development Goal. Some of the entry points they discussed include “the promotion of crop diversification…, strengthening local food production and processing, and exploring regulatory or voluntary instruments for promoting healthy diets” (goals 2). Promoting the nutrition aspect of the goal can help achieve it because nutrients are what keep people alive and
There are barriers in certain lifestyles or dietary choices that influence with an individual will eat. It also depends on the life stages or the group of people in question. Those groups can be classified as low income, high income, adults, children, and teens. In order to influence the diet of a particular person there has to be a plan with groups that have different priorities. There is solutions that involve the investment in research so that people in remote areas also have a way to access nutritional food and the technology to be able to keep up with the growing population. Advances in technology are needed to insure the availability of resources to future generations. With knew finding new ways are farming can be found that allow farmers to plant more types of crops. This will influence the region's food choices. Maintaining a sustainable food system is important in shaping consumer