Do you travel frequently, or even a little bit of going from a place to another for some work or family function might be enough. I guess all of us do, or maybe if you don’t, then take the road or the rail this time. When you do, you might be sitting in your compartment or at the window seat of your car, and then just let your eyes trail out the window. You might see beautiful things, and you might also see ugly things. You might see flourishing flowers and barren lands.
This time when you see a four-year-old kid, staring at you or your vehicle blankly with his hunger struck eyes, ask yourself. Ask yourself, what did you do to deserve this, and what did he do to be deprived even a day’s meal? Ask yourself, was it his choice to be deprived of the basic human necessity? When you see his rib cage bulging out of his chest like there is no flesh present over them and it is all a layer of skin, did he choose his body to be deprived of the nutrients? Or his parents were wealthy and didn’t to feed that kid? I guess you’ll then see the hardships of life.
I say you find out the data about how many people suffer severe food insecurity globally. And when like all of the times you google it, you’ll come across a whopping figure of 700 million people who are highly food insecure or don’t have a single clue whether the next meal in their plates would be served or not.
What about us? The ones reading or writing these articles, what are we doing to help them? What are we doing to let them have at least a day’s meal? You ever asked yourself, do you need everything you own or waste? Can everything you disregard be used a more fruitful way, and every time you’ll ask this question to yourself, the answer will be yes.
But the question here is WHY? Why there is an enormous number of hungry people? Where did we go wrong or what happened to us that even after many advancements of our civilization, we still have those who crave the basic amenities?
WHY?
Now when you have realized how things are on the outskirts of the world you have been living in, it’s time you ask yourself why?
We have major technological innovations, we have developed fertilizers that could increase the productivity of the crops by almost ten times, and still, here we are.
Someone’s talking about living on the moon; other’s are talking about enhancing their defences such that no foreign invaders could break into their walls and harm them. But all of these people who are planning these things are overlooking something. That something is the number of people dying of hunger, and while they are busy finding a new home for living the one they have been living on and the people they have been surrounded are dying under their big fat nose.
What do you think about a monarch who has around a hundred dishes on his/her table and can choose to eat even a spoon from them all? Should being born into a specific family allow you to have all those luxuries? I hope your answer is no but is this a real-life answer? Look over the globe, one of the most technologically advanced countries which ruled many parts of the world still has a royal family.
Just being born in that family buys you a ticket to spend the rest of your life enjoying the royal benefits. Whereas on the other hand just because of being born in a low-income family, gets you the hardships nobody has to go through. What makes these two newborns different other than the place they were born? Or the families they were raised into. I guess nothing accept their genes. And so I do firmly believe that they should have an equal right to food, and they should be given equal opportunities.
But that’s not the whole picture, is it? We have scorched our mother earth for so long that the soil now isn’t capable of producing the same amount of crops as it used to and hence the productivity has severely decreased. The use of excessive fertilizers and other chemicals has led to severe degradation of various sources of life. Everything that man does harms nature in one or the other way and which in turn affects the productivity of the crops. And even when the farmers work day and night, there is a lack of proper storage facilities which lead to spoilage of capable dinner of hundreds of nights for hundreds of families.
All the floods, disasters, and natural calamities have increased by more than a significant amount in recent years. Why do you think mother nature is striking back? Maybe you should try and find the answer to this question someday.
You might be thinking what do the natural calamities have to do with world hunger? So what if I say according to the data of the past ten years from a 2015 report alone showcases around 70 billion dollar worth of livestock being destroyed by natural calamities.
Since then, five years have passed, and the current world scenario amidst the pandemic is worse, with floods, tsunamis, and various forest fires the one who had hard times securing their meals earlier than these are starving to death. The ones who are in severe need of help, all across the globe are tempted to hang themselves rather than seeing their offsprings starve to death.
It’s still not all of it, I guess the list of reasons is never going to end, but there is one more critical issue, population. Yes, you read it right, population. We can call this term an issue for almost any of the major problems humanity is facing. The excessive reproduction of humanity is a major drawback of our civilization.
You can think it off as, more humans lead to more consumption of food, and as per our current scenarios, we are not able to produce as much as we consume. So that is a major problem that we should address and act upon because it would be no use worrying over birth control once the time has passed.
The Fight with Hunger
Amidst the war between survival and the cherishing moments of growing up, these kids have to choose survival. They are not provided with any other option. You say they should join schools and colleges, and then change their destiny. Think about it when you repeat this, someone who has a hungry stomach and that person gets ten dollars, what would he/she do? Will, he/she, buy a book, which can indeed change his/her future, or will he/she save the money and use it for his/her meals. I guess you got the answer to your question.
These people are fighting; they are fighting with all their might. The kids start working from age; you were still learning to hold a pen. The elders work two to three jobs a day. A woman does labour and isn’t even paid an equivalent amount to the men. So next time you see a kid who is selling a pen and not stealing something from you, treat him with kindness. Purchase the pen you might need it, or you can donate it to someone who does.
We are finally walking
Yes, we are walking now, even at a languid pace, but are on the path to minimize the possibility of an empty stomach. I won’t say to make hunger extinct in this world, because that would be huge and charming to dream off, so let’s be realistic, eh? People are coming forward to help those who can’t help themselves. We humans can do anything, and believe me when I say this, the current need of the century is to wage war on hunger. People are working for various NGOs, WHO, and many other independent organizations whose main aim is to provide the basic amenities of a person’s life.
Okay, so let me ask you one final question. What would you do if you got to participate in our war against hunger? What part would you like to play? Maybe taking the first step in the direction of helping someone would be a tremendous start. Gradually you’ll learn how to grow, and to take only as much as you need and not how much you desire. Slowly you’ll discover that we should give something back to the world, which might be worth in calming the chaos that we have submerged ourselves into.
I am not naming any of the NGOs or institutions working in this frame, because if you’re with me until this point, then you might also be aware that you could google these things. But I am telling you this, that reading this article is the very step of yours against the war we might start sooner or later. Each of you and we reading this has already contributed to the meal on someone’s plate. I desperately hope you continue the excellent work, and help not everyone but at least the maximum number of people you could.
Follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter to stay connected.
