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FinalCall.com News
Perspectives
Rising food costs hit most vulnerable in U.S.
By Nicole Lee
-Guest Columnist-
Updated May 5, 2008 - 1:29:00 PM
The Washington Post, in a recent front page article, reported on the devastating effects of rising food prices. Officials stated they cannot afford to provide basic nutrition to children. Rising costs of corn, wheat, fruit and milk are “really hitting us,” one official said, while lamenting that the situation “is not sustainable”
This is not a government official from a country in sub-Saharan Africa. Or Haiti. This is a quote from an official in the New York City public school system. Schools from New York to Florida are struggling to keep up with rising food costs in order to provide nutritious school lunches.
Last year, the New York City school system paid over $3 million for milk alone. The article stated that sharp rises in the cost of milk, grain and fresh fruits and vegetables are hitting cafeterias across the country, forcing cash-strapped schools to raise prices or pinch pennies.
For some time in the U.S., we have taken for granted that an abundance of food is our divine right. Yet this myth has begun to meet actual reality. We can no longer afford food for our families.
With the ravages of rising oil prices, coupled with genetic bio-markets and a food subsidy system not prepared to feed all the world’s people, Americans may just be seeing the first wave of concern. We now live within a world economic system of our own making—a system Americans may not be able to navigate.
Recent weeks have seen food-related protests in Niger, Haiti Cameroon, Senegal, Burkina Faso, Morocco, Mauritania, Ivory Coast and Egypt. A NPR story on Haiti’s food crisis referred to Haiti as the “canary in the mine” and that the rest of us must heed the warning.
Ironically, but not surprisingly, leaders from international financial institutions who have created and supported the very trade policies which led to food insecurity are now expressing concern with the current food shortages. IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn concluded that if food prices continue to rise, “Hundreds of thousands of people will be starving ... (leading) to disruption of the economic environment.”
If we consider the already vulnerable economic environments of many countries throughout Africa and the Diaspora, any small increase in food prices furthers these ominous circumstances.
Though stable and secure access to food and potable water are basic human rights, the U.S. has consistently shown its apathy and ineptitude towards addressing domestic and international food insecurity. At the 2002 World Food Summit, the U.S. stood alone in opposition to inclusion of “food as a human right” within a declaration to be signed by all governments. The U.S. additionally promoted the importance of genetically modified crops as key to eliminating poverty and ensuring food security. Genetically modified crops decrease food diversity, force small farmers to use this technology at an increased expense, and ignore alternative, organic and indigenous agricultural development plans.
The recent release of the International Assessment of Agricultural Science and Technology for Development Report, commissioned by the World Bank and the UN Food and Agricultural Organization, determined that the crisis of rising food prices cannot be compared to those in recent history. The report concludes that “the mounting crisis in food security is of a different complexity and potentially different magnitude than the one of the 1960s.”
Food insecurity requires our immediate attention. First, we must accept that current U.S. and international economic policies have led to this current state of riots, violence, malnutrition, and death. We must accept that food insecurity is a national security priority that will not be addressed by a few quick fixes or more free trade, but that our economic structure requires systemic change. If not, given the reality of global warming, the effects of agribusiness and the decreasing options for sustainable livelihoods, U.S. Americans must face the real possibility of being on the losing end of the impending resource wars.
(Nicole C. Lee is the executive director of TransAfrica Forum. This commentary was distributed by NNPA.)
