Wednesday, November 12, 2008
The 25 cent strategy to end world hunger
I need to read some books on ending world hunger. Josette Sheeran, the Executive director of the U.N. World Food Programme was on Letterman about a month ago. I don't care for Josette Sheeran, she was foisted on the WFP by the Bush administration & has some pretty dubious past associations. Her tenure at the agency may be short after Jan 20. But she gave a jaw-dropping, attainable figure for ending world starvation; that is, the cost of putting every starving & at-risk hungry human on a sustenance diet, which is what has to be accomplished before those people can turn their attention to anything else. I don't recall the number, but $50 billion per year is a ballpark figure according to other organizations. A few say it can take less. That's not the price tag to the United States, but a cost shared by the entire world. The whole freakin' world.
It makes me ask, "Why the hell don't we just do it?'
Sheeran begs us for small donations - "Just 25 cents a day or 50 US Dollars a year." That's how the good kids from St. Genevieve's restock the local church food pantry. With them, I can donate $5, or a bag of canned goods, & they'll come over & pick up a frozen turkey if I call & make an appointment. Think bigger, Josette. "The agency relies entirely on voluntary contributions." Well, it's an absurd, unreliable way to end world hunger.
We're throwing mind-boggling numbers around for various economic bail-outs, & we don't even know what the money will accomplish. More pedicure retreats for CEOs? Keeping SUV assembly lines rolling? But we won't, in concert with other developed nations, put a cup of some yucky nutritional porridge & maybe a couple of "BP-5 High Energy Biscuits" in the hands of everyone who needs it to keep from starving to death. Could we sprinkle some vaccines into the mix, too? There's an organization working on providing every child in the third world with an inedible wireless laptop. For heaven's sake, let's give them a snack, too.
Dear Josette Sheeran: With all your connections, all the boards of directors you've sat on, all the diplomats & global corporate wheeler-dealers & war profiteers & think tank geniuses you know, with the resources of the U.N., can you somehow pull together $12.5 billion & give it a test try in 2009 with 1/4th the starving people to see if it's possible?
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be." Thomas Jefferson
It makes me ask, "Why the hell don't we just do it?'
Sheeran begs us for small donations - "Just 25 cents a day or 50 US Dollars a year." That's how the good kids from St. Genevieve's restock the local church food pantry. With them, I can donate $5, or a bag of canned goods, & they'll come over & pick up a frozen turkey if I call & make an appointment. Think bigger, Josette. "The agency relies entirely on voluntary contributions." Well, it's an absurd, unreliable way to end world hunger.
We're throwing mind-boggling numbers around for various economic bail-outs, & we don't even know what the money will accomplish. More pedicure retreats for CEOs? Keeping SUV assembly lines rolling? But we won't, in concert with other developed nations, put a cup of some yucky nutritional porridge & maybe a couple of "BP-5 High Energy Biscuits" in the hands of everyone who needs it to keep from starving to death. Could we sprinkle some vaccines into the mix, too? There's an organization working on providing every child in the third world with an inedible wireless laptop. For heaven's sake, let's give them a snack, too.
Dear Josette Sheeran: With all your connections, all the boards of directors you've sat on, all the diplomats & global corporate wheeler-dealers & war profiteers & think tank geniuses you know, with the resources of the U.N., can you somehow pull together $12.5 billion & give it a test try in 2009 with 1/4th the starving people to see if it's possible?
