The Face of Hunger

We continue to move deeper into a global hunger crisis as food prices keeping spiraling ever upward. But the crisis is not just about the inability of the poor to buy the basic essentials necessary to stay alive.

We need to understand that this is a global crisis that transcends hunger. The stability of governments around the globe is threatened by the food insecurity of their populations. Leaders are facing the ugly reality first mentioned by the Roman politician, Seneca, who wrote, “A hungry people listens not to reason, nor cares for justice, nor is bent by any prayers.”

When food is available, but priced out of reach, the hungry cannot be expected to be patient. Parents of malnourished and starving children aren’t interested in explanations and platitudes. They don’t have time for speeches. They want food. And they want it immediately.

The growing hunger and food insecurity of the world’s poor directly impacts global security. Albert Einstein echoed Seneca’s views when he wrote, “An empty stomach is not a good political adviser.”  We are seeing this being played out as the hungry poor around the world are demonstrating that there are more direct ways to address injustice than suffering in silence.

Unless global leaders take rapid measures to insure that the food security needs of the poor and hungry are met, unless a more just distribution system for the world’s dwindling resources is put into place, unless we start living as if we are all truly one global family, we will be witness to far more demonstrations and violence on the part of the poor. As one Danish proverb states, Better cross an angry man than a hungry man.”

Lord of the Harvest,

              You are the One who causes our work to be blessed with profit. You send the gentle rain. You control the storms. You protect us from destruction. In return, Father, we want to share our blessings with the poor, the lonely, the hungry, the hopeless. You have commanded we leave the remnants of our harvests for the poor, but help us do more. Help us to share, not merely our leftovers, but our very living, if necessary, to relieve the suffering of others. We cannot sit in luxury and watch them grovel in despair. Give us hearts of compassion, and let us do much more than you ask of us.

                     Amen

The global food crisis continues to grow. And it is not about a shortage of food. There is plenty of food, but escalating prices are pushing it further out of the reach of those most in need. The poor can no longer afford enough food to keep themselves and their families alive.

This is the topic of the “High Level Conference on World Food Security: The Challenges of Climate Change and Bio-energy,” currently taking place in Rome at the headquarters of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. The three day conference is an attempt to get the world to focus serious attention on an unfolding tragedy of massive proportions. Fifty heads of State and government leaders are working to develop a consensus on halting escalating food prices before the impact causes more global suffering and political unrest.

Over a billion people suffer from chronic hunger. Another two billion are malnourished. That means over three billion of our human family, almost half the world population is now food-insecure. Eighteen thousand children die every day as a result of malnutrition.

Pope Benedict sent a strongly worded message to the conference participants. He wrote that, “hunger and malnutrition are unacceptable in a world which has, in fact, levels of production, resources and knowledge sufficient to put an end to such dramas and their consequences. The great challenge of today is to ‘globalize,’ not just economic and commercial interests, but also the call for solidarity, while respecting and taking advantage of the contribution of all components of society.”

The Holy Father also added that, “purely technical and economic considerations must not prevail over the duties of justice toward people suffering from hunger.”

So far, however, it seems no one at the conference has time for the concept of justice. Even though U. N. General Secretary Ban Ki-Moon opened the conference by urging the delegates to act with a “sense of purpose and mission,” such is not what seems to be happening.

Ignoring the “duties of justice” the delegates are themselves pontificating on their nations’ political goals. From President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe (who has single-handedly destroyed the breadbasket of Southern Africa and pushed two-thirds of his country into hunger and starvation), to the US Secretary of Agriculture, Ed Schafer, the delegates are speaking mostly about the economic issues and political priorities in their own countries. There is no focus needs of the poor and hungry.

Such a lack of leadership in a time of crisis is deplorable. It is also to be expected. Politics will always prevail of the needs of the poor. 

But, regardless of the outcome of the FAO global food crisis conference, the world will have to respond to the food price tsunami battering the world’s most vulnerable. Unless the issue is addressed soon there will be more than one government that will be toppled by hungry citizens who have nothing to lose.

Pope Benedict is urging all Christians to help the international efforts to alleviate the escalating food price crisis threatening millions around the world. He made his plea during his regular Angelus address to the pilgrims at St. Peter’s Square in Rome.

“Whoever is nourished by the bread of Christ cannot remain indifferent before those who, in our times too, are deprived of daily bread,” the Pope said in a statement referring to the sacrament of the Eucharist.

The Pontiff then added that, “This problem is getting more and more serious and the international community is struggling to resolve it.”

The Pope’s remarks comes only a couple of weeks before the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations is scheduled to host a summit in Rome to discuss the issues and growing difficulties spawned by the record-high food prices around the globe. The meeting is set for June 3–5.

The storm of rising food prices threaten to undo all the gains made by the Millennium Development Goals, as well as to push additional millions of poor into increased hunger and misery. Unless the escalating commodity prices can be checked, and both short-term and long-term help be extended to the countries in most desperate need there is a real and present danger of serious destabilization of numerous fragile governments around the world, many in highly sensitive regions.

Food riots and demonstrations have already erupted in dozens of developing countries, and the government of Haiti has already been toppled due to the rising food prices. Food insecurity is now a major factor in global insecurity and needs to be addressed as such.

But, as the Pope so eloquently stated, for Christians, the call to help feed the poor comes from our faith…not our fear. Faithfulness demands that we respond to the needs of the hungry in the same love we have received. Indifference to the hungry is denial of the one we claim to follow.