A World Free from Hunger

 

Too little is produced, that is the cause of the whole thing. But why is too little produced? Not because the limits of production – even today and with present day means – are exhausted. No, but because the limits of production are determined not by the number of hungry bellies but by the number of purges able to buy and to pay. Bourgeois society does not and cannot wish to produce any more. The moneyless bellies, the labour which cannot be utilized for profit and therefore cannot buy, is left to the death-rate. Let a sudden industrial boom, such as is constantly occurring, make it possible for this labour to be employed with profit, then it will get money to spend, and the means of subsistence have never hitherto been lacking. This is the vicious circle in which the whole economic system revolves. One presupposes bourgeois conditions as a whole, and then proves that every part of them is a necessary part – and therefore an “eternal law.” - Engels to F.A. Lange

 

A hunger-free world is possible but only if we re-set our global economic system which can allow people to change how we grow and eat our food. Hunger and malnutrition generally are symptoms of a larger underlying problem — poverty. This economic system, as Rachel Carson, the pioneer ecologist, put it, recognises no other gods but those of profit and production. Food is treated as just another commodity. No distinction is made in this respect between necessities and luxuries. The rich can afford to purchase anything they wish while the poor are not able to acquire even their most basic needs. Under capitalist relations people have no right to an adequate diet, shelter, and medical attention. People may have a “biological demand” for food—we all need food, just as we need water and air, to continue to live. But as with other commodities, people are excluded from access to necessities without what economists call “effective demand” cannot buy sufficient nutritious food. Of course, lack of “effective demand” in this case means that the poor don’t have enough money to buy the food they need. The market is not efficient at all. It is also absolutely unable to act as a mechanism to end poverty and hunger.

The capitalist food chain is under strain with hunger, malnutrition, obesity, and food waste loss on the rise. The causes of hunger and famine have little to do with a shortage of food. Our planet currently produces an abundance of food. This tragic story is indubitably the most striking indictment and condemnation of our barbaric capitalist society.

We live in a world in which, as with all other industries, a few multinational corporations dominate the world’s food market.  One central problem in the food system is one of exploitation of small producers and the landless labourers for the interests of those powerful Big Business groups. Their control over the supply chain allows them to capture the value created by the labour of peasants and small farmers, as well as capture the value created in the industrial processing of raw foodstuffs by the workers they employ in their factories.  World hunger is due to the corporations that control food production and its distribution. 

Only in a socialist world will the benefits of scientific agriculture be given to all of the peoples of the world, because only a socialist economy can permit the rational planning of food production. Ending world hunger is quite simple. Almost every country in the world has the soil, water, and climate resources to grow enough food so that all their people can eat a healthy diet. In addition, the knowledge and crop varieties already exist in most countries so that if farmers are given adequate assistance they will be able to grow reasonably high yields of crops. Instead of the emphasis  on production of export cash-crops which under capitalism helps a country’s balance of payments, it does not ensure sufficient food for everyone nor does it promote a healthy rural environment. It leads naturally to the production of high-value luxury crops demanded by export markets (luxuries such as cut-flowers grown in Kenya), rather than the low-value subsistence crops needed to meet the needs of the local population. Production of sufficient amounts of the right kinds of food by small farmers working in cooperatives or on their own and using sustainable techniques is the best way to achieve the goal of “food security.” This, of course, means not taking land out of food production to produce crops for the bio-fuel markets.

THE REAL GREEN PARTY