Rising food prices, famine in the horn of Africa, climate change, seasonal hunger, uncertainty about the future of the global food system.
World Food Day and Blog action Day are on October 16, and one hopes this day will inspire many ideas and innovations to tackle the World’s food security challenges. One such idea is - ‘small is beautiful’. Duncan Green explains why small farmers are actually beneficial when it comes to agriculture. One obvious reason is “it puts food into circulation and at the same time boosts the income of some of the poorest people on the planet”. Read his post to know more. Also, revisit the post "Seasonal Hunger" on this blog to know about the specific policy actions that can end the occurrence of this cycle.
What started the ‘Occupy Wall Street’ protests? Corporate greed or economic inequality? The Arab Spring or the Adbusters Media Foundation?‘. In the mid-19th century, the real income of most workers was similar and low in many countries, but by the early 21st century, this changed significantly as a result of large gaps in mean income between countries, thus leading to global income differences, says a new research paper by Barnko Milanovic. In short, location matters in global income inequality. Read this interesting paper "Global inequality: from class to location, from proletarians to migrants" to know more.
Speaking of inequality, “women in Egypt and Tunisia are both hopeful and fearful about what the Arab revolutions might mean for them”, says a recent Economist article. There is no doubt that women played a vital role as did men in these revolutions, but it’s time for law makers in these countries to recognize this equality and incorporate a broader interpretation of women’s rights in their new constitutions. In another interesting development in gender equality, UK is proposing changes to the royal succession rule by giving girls the same right of succession as boys. Hopefully this can trigger some more changes in terms of gender parity.
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