July 25, 2008

In grocery stores across the country, Americans are experiencing an extreme spike in food prices. In addition to rising costs at the gas pump, consumers are being forced to cut back on staples such as bread, milk and fresh vegetables. Many economists attribute the increased costs to a combination of high demand, labor shortages, natural disasters and higher energy prices. 

Accordingly, in a recent poll, The Alliance to End Hunger found that 65% of American voters said that rising food prices have had an impact on them, including a startling 28% who are worried that they or someone they know will go hungry. The poll also found that 37% of voters have cut back on the amount of food they buy.

While the higher prices have hurt Americans who devote 10% of their take home pay for food, food pantries and shelters across the nation are serving more meals in order to prevent people from going hungry. Bread for the World recently reported that food banks are being swamped, and there are concerns that more American children are going without food. Due to the economic downturn, many families that are turning to shelters for aid are not unemployed, but cannot make ends meet while earning minimum wage.

On the global level, advocacy groups estimate that 862 million people are chronically hungry, and 100 million more have been driven to routine hunger. The world's poor have traditionally contributed a greater portion of their earnings to food and therefore have suffered immensely as a result of higher prices. Now, they are forgoing other basic needs such as medical care and clothes to feed their families.

"They are coping by eating less," said David Beckmann, president of both The Alliance and Bread for the World in a report following the High-Level Conference on World Food Security in Rome in June. People are "eating poorer quality foods, seeking help from family members, selling small livestock, and pulling their children out of school." There is also a growing concern for under nutrition that has plagued children and mothers in particular as a result of unaffordable food costs.

While the current crisis has not led to famine, food is certainly much more difficult to come by and families are making sacrifices by eating fewer meals a day. The several dozen food riots that have broken out in developing countries have further undermined already unstable governments that have done little beyond subsidizing food items.

For this reason, increased foreign aid from developed countries and international institutions is critical to effectively addressing the global food crisis. Foreign investment in the agricultural system of poor countries, for example, has the benefit of increasing food production as well as the income of poor families.

MPAC, along with other faith-based and for- and non-profit organizations, is a member of The Alliance to End Hunger, which brokers partnerships between its members to help create food security for the hungry people they serve. Join the current effort to reduce hunger by learning how organizations such as the United Nations' World Food Programme (WFP) and Bread for the World are leading the fight to address this crisis around the world.