Creative-i

27 July, 2010 — IPS

More than 1 billion people suffer hunger today, according to the UN. A crucial part of this complex problem is food production and distribution. Is it possible to increase food production in an environmentally and socially sustainable way? Can modernisation, research and investment enhance food security? Is there anything to learn from traditional knowledge? How do trade and energy policies affect the equation? And gender? Where and when is food aid really needed? Can the upswing of commodity prices be positive for some countries? How are farmers coping with climate change?

IPS finds the stories behind the current food crisis to understand local and global causes of shortages and rising prices, and their long term effects.

AFRICA: Everything but Arms Deal Doesn’t Benefit Enough People
Isolda Agazzi
GENEVA, Jul 15 – The Everything but Arms trade initiative, which provides preferential treatment to poor countries, benefits only a limited range of people in the target populations. It should also be expanded to more countries, civil society organisations say.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=52166

INDIA: Farmers Push Comeback of Cereal of the Poor
Anitha Reddy* – IPS/IFEJ
KARNATAKA, India, June 18 – Eshwarappa Banakar has been a farmer most of his adult life, but these days he has also turned banker ? banker of seeds, that is, and especially of millet strains.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=51868

ASIA: Green Revolution Has Little to Offer New Hungry Mouths

Marwaan Macan-Markar
BANGKOK, June 5 – As it took root in the rice fields across Asia, it was hailed as the solution to the hunger afflicting millions of people in the region. But four decades on, the much vaunted Green Revolution appears to have reached its limits, unable to meet new demands, to feed new mouths.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=51729

AFRICA: Small Scale Farmers Vulnerable to New Wheat Fungus

Omer Redi*
ADDIS ABABA, May 29 – Smallholder wheat farmers are at risk as new mutations of a wheat-killing fungus have recently been discovered.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=51635

MALAYSIA: Encroaching Forest, Oil Palm Plantations Alarm Villagers

Anil Netto
PENANG, Malaysia, May 21 – A increasing number of natives in Sarawak state in north Borneo are alarmed at encroaching forest and oil palm plantations, which are taking over their native customary land and destroying their traditional lifestyles and biodiversity.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=51530

BURMA: Two Years after Nargis, Life Is Far from Normal

Mon Mon Myat
BOGALAY, Burma, Apr 30 – Kyaw Moe is just in his 30s, but he is already on his second shot at life ? just like the rest of the residents of Thakan Ngu, a tiny Burmese village in this township of Bogalay.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=51269

KENYA: Successful Weather Prediction Uses Old and New

Isaiah Esipisu
NAIROBI, Apr 29 – In the wake of ever-changing climatic conditions, a study in western Kenya has discovered that combining traditional methods of weather prediction with meteorological forecasting is the best way of obtaining more accurate forecast data.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=51260

If Only Just a Billion Were Hungry

Paul Virgo
ROME, Apr 29 – The bad news is that 1.02 billion people are going hungry in today’s world of plentiful supplies. The even worse news is that this figure only tells part of the global food insecurity story.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=51250

ROMANIA: Slow Food – Opportunity for Small Farmers

Claudia Ciobanu
BRASOV, Apr 27 – Mari Cat, an economist by profession, thinks nothing of selling meat, bread and apple juice at a stall in the ?Slow Food? market in this central Romanian town.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=51207

EAST AFRICA: Green Agriculture Growing in Leaps and Bounds

Isolda Agazzi
NAIROBI, Apr 21 – Organic agriculture using natural farming methods rather than fertilisers and pesticides has made significant gains in African countries ? not just among farmers but among consumers too.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=51138

AFRICA: Foreign Investors Safeguarded From Obligations to Locals

Isolda Agazzi
NAIROBI, Apr 19 – Parts of the Tana Delta on Kenya?s northern coastline are being leased to foreigners to grow food and bio-fuels for export. Civil society organisations are worried about such deals as they are done without public consultation while safeguarding investors from requirements that could benefit local communities, such as technology transfer.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=51094

AFRICA: Land Grabs Continue as Elites Resist Regulation

Hilaire Avril
PARIS, Apr 13 – A year after the purchases of vast swathes of farm land in Africa first drew public attention, transactions remain as opaque as ever.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=51018

TANZANIA: Weather Changes Turn Farming into Gamble with Nature

Denis Gathanju
DAR-ES-SALAAM, Mar 10 – Changes in weather patterns have turned agriculture into a gamble with nature for Tanzanian farmers. Prolonged droughts and floods have made the lives of small-scale farmers, who don?t have access to irrigation, extremely difficult.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=50618

PHILIPPINES: Street Kids Learn to Save in Times of Crisis

Kara Santos*
MANILA, Feb 5 – Since he dropped out of elementary school, 17-year old Cenen has been making a living for himself driving a borrowed motorised sidecar in the crowded streets of Binondo, a bustling business district in Manila, capital of the Philippines.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=50229

PHILIPPINES: Economic Recovery Unfelt by Urban Poor

Kara Santos
MANILA, Feb 4 – Every day, 60-year old Felisa scavenges for garbage around the bustling streets of Manila, the urban capital of the Philippines.
ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=50214

Read more IPS reporting on food and agriculture here.
ipsnews.net/new_focus/feedingfuture/
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