Malthus Redux -- The Global Food Crisis

Another must read post from Abu Muqawama:

The global food crisis is perhaps the least reported big event of the year. It stands to kill far more people than the cyclone in Myanmar or the earthquake in China. First it will kill through starvation, and then through the conflict over resources that it spawns. At a conference of experts that Kip observed on Afghanistan several weeks ago, all agreed that rising food prices were the single thing capable of throwing the country into utter and perhaps unrecoverable chaos. The same might be true of nuclear-armed Pakistan as well, not to mention several dozen other weak or failing states.

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My Comment: His analysis on the impact that rising food prices have in fermenting conflicts and eventually wars is on the mark. Hunger rarely starts wars right away, instead it just prepares the groundwork for turmoil and conflicts to arise.

Previous Post: The Price Of Food, The Cost Of Despair

Ethiopian Millions 'Risk Hunger'

From The BBC:

Six million children in Ethiopia are at risk of acute malnutrition following the failure of rains, the UN children's agency, Unicef, has warned.

More than 60,000 children in two Ethiopian regions require immediate specialist feeding just to survive, Unicef says.

The situation is expected to worsen in the next few months as crops fail.

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Update: Drought returns to haunt Ethiopia -- Reuters

My Comment: With Sudan at war with its neighbors and its own citizens, Ethiopia involved in maintaining some sort of stability in Somalia, Kenya breaking down along tribal lines ..... all that this region now needs is a famine. Another generation that will be lost to war and conflict.