Also some of the aid agencies have way too high administration costs. One wonders just how much aid is getting to those in need and just how much of our donations goes to "administrative" costs.
This is another disincentive for those who care about what is going on and might want to do something. arthur From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Keith Hudson Sent: Monday, August 01, 2011 4:02 AM To: RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, , EDUCATION; D and N Subject: Re: [Futurework] Earth to hit 7 billion mark this year, straining developing regions - CNN.com Natalie, At 22:00 31/07/2011, you wrote: Keith, Apart from change of the rebel regime, how would you go about getting food to countless starving Somalians, if not at a distribution centre? Dropping relief packages isn't that easy. What are your thoughts? Deeply distressing though all this is, where would I get the food from? The world is already close to maximum production. Besides, increasing food acreage is now being turned over to biofuels and grain to feed livestock for the more prosperous consumers. The total amount of basic 'survival-food' (grain) is declining significantly. The only other point I can add to what I wrote originally is that humanitarian aid from advanced nation governments is less than half of what it was only 20 years ago even though the need is greater. Private middle-class aid from these countries via the large charities is also declining -- and quite steeply since 2008/9. Now that the world's currency system is becoming more and more chaotic, and investors are searching around for safe assets, even second-grade agricultural land is now high on the list. Millions of the starving will be pushed and pulled into refugee camps and cities. I can see no other possible practical answer. The whole tragedy will have to play itself out over the course of the next two or three generations. Keith By what I've read, entire villages are forced to leave home because crops have failed and livestock have starved to death. They depart en mass for settlements they think can assist in some way. The distribution centres seem to be coming to these large congregations of new nomads and refugees. Their abandoned lands, as you state, unfortunately go up for grabs. Yet were they to stay, they'd just die off without a fighting chance, or be forced out by on-going violence, and the government would get their lands anyway. Donation campaigns for this type of crisis are organized to accumulate funds completely apart from ongoing missions. It's therefore food that is surplus, never would have been rounded up for anyone else. I have reservations when it comes to Red Cross, for example, who failed to get "special" donations distributed to Katrina and Tsunami victims well after the first years of incident, but their efforts don't tend to feed or provide water, mostly just blankets and tents. The Humanitarian Coalition appear to be getting through because rebel forces now want the support of the people for governmental power. It costs them nothing, and relieves the worry of an uprising. The Coalition is comprised of organizations more effective at relief than just charity, and a lot of suffering will be relieved. Hopefully, a better government will emerge, or at least the realization that it's hard to stay wealthy without a fed working class to conduct the manual labour. Natalia On 7/30/2011 4:08 AM, Keith Hudson wrote: Contrary to most projections I think we're probably close to maximum world population already -- maybe still rising for another 15-20 years, but scarcely longer than that. As I see it, we're already running into a fundamental limit to food production due to freshwater shortages. No doubt gains will be made by the agriculturalisation of large tracts of land in Africa that are now being bought by China and also Western and Middle Eastern investment funds, but the additional carbohydrate will be preferentially sold for livestock feed in order to upgrade the diets of the millions of newly rising Chinese, Brazilians, etc. The improved diet of one new middle-class person effectively deprives the (almost total) carbohydrate diet of at least three or four others. Meanwhile populations in the advanced countries are declining fast due to the TFR (total fertility rate) being already less than replacement. Whether this will be compensated for by immigration from Africa, etc, is a moot point. Resistance to immigration is becoming fiercer from year to year. But even if immigrants replace the die-offs in the advanced countries they'll also adjust to less-than-replacement family sizes within two generations. I don't donate to appeals from the large charities such as the present big ones which are active in Somalia for two reasons, despite the poignant scenes we see on television: (a) it encourages "refugee-itis" from huge areas around a newly-erected camp (or even a rumour that there might be one), even attracting many of those who were just about surviving. This empties the landscape more effectively than drought and actually encourages corrupt politicians to sell/lease land to the investment funds; (b) food that's bought by the charities for the refugee camps is actually depriving food from equivalent numbers of people elsewhere. Keith At 01:06 30/07/2011, you wrote: http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/07/27/world.population.growth/index.html Earth to hit 7 billion mark this year, straining developing regions By the CNN Wire Staff July 28, 2011 9:28 p.m. EDT The world population hit 6 billion people in 1999 and <http://i.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2011/US/07/27/world.population.growth/t1larg.wo rld.nasa.jpg> The world population hit 6 billion people in 1999 and is set to reach 7 billion this year. STORY HIGHLIGHTS * The "demographic center of gravity" is shifting to less-developed regions * Growth has been dramatic: It was just in 1800 that the world held 1 billion people * The developing regions will face big difficulties with food, water, housing and energy (CNN) -- Earth will become home to 7 billion people later this year, and most of the planet's growth will affect the developing countries the most, straining those regions' limited resources, a Harvard University professor said Thursday. The world's growth has been dramatic: It was just in 1999 that the global population reached 6 billion. United Nations projections call for the population to reach 10.1 billion in 2100, according to David Bloom, a professor of economics and demography at the Harvard School of Public Health, in an article published in the July 29 issue of Science. By 2050, about 2.3 billion more people will be added, nearly as many as the total living on the globe as recently as 1950, Bloom said. Humanity grew slowly through most of history, taking until 1800 for the population to hit 1 billion. In the past half-century, the population grew from 3 billion to about 7 billion. Forecasts call for the world's "demographic center of gravity" to shift from more-developed to less-developed regions, Bloom wrote in his article, according to a Harvard news release. This means the developing world will face hardships in providing food, water, housing and energy to their growing populations, with repercussions for health, security and economic growth. The demographic picture is indeed complex, and poses some formidable challenges. --David Bloom, professor of economics and demography, Harvard School of Public Health "The demographic picture is indeed complex, and poses some formidable challenges," Bloom said. "Those challenges are not insurmountable, but we cannot deal with them by sticking our heads in the sand. We have to tackle some tough issues ranging from the unmet need for contraception among hundreds of millions of women and the huge knowledge-action gaps we see in the area of child survival, to the reform of retirement policy and the development of global immigration policy. It's just plain irresponsible to sit by idly while humankind experiences full force the perils of demographic change," Bloom said. In the next 40 years, virtually all (97%) of the world's 2.3 billion projected increase will be in the underdeveloped regions, with nearly half (49%) in Africa. Meanwhile, the populations of more developed countries will remain flat. As those peoples age, however, there will be fewer working-age adults to support retirees living on social pensions, Bloom said. "Although the issues immediately confronting developing countries are different from those facing the rich countries, in a globalized world demographic challenges anywhere are demographic challenges everywhere," Bloom wrote. In 2011, about 135 million people will be born and 57 million will die -- a net increase of 78 million. But uncertainly exists about the global projections, Bloom wrote. Depending on whether the number of births per woman continues to decline, population predictions for 2050 span from 8.1 billion to 10.6 billion, and the 2100 projections vary from 6.2 billion to 15.8 billion, Bloom said. CNN's Michael Martinez contributed to this report. Keith Hudson, Saltford, England http://allisstatus.wordpress.com/2011/07/ _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list <mailto:[email protected]> [email protected] <https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework> https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework Keith Hudson, Saltford, England http://allisstatus.wordpress.com/2011/07/
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