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From: bzs@bu-cs.BU.EDU (Barry Shein)
Newsgroups: misc.consumers,sci.bio,sci.misc
Subject: Re: pesticides
Message-ID: <11964@bu-cs.BU.EDU>
Date: Sun, 16-Aug-87 16:31:08 EDT
Article-I.D.: bu-cs.11964
Posted: Sun Aug 16 16:31:08 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 16-Aug-87 22:58:01 EDT
References: <4960@ihlpa.ATT.COM> <246@etn-rad.UUCP> <7952@mimsy.UUCP> <10850@bu-cs.BU.EDU> <1452@terminus.UUCP>
Organization: Boston U. Comp. Sci.
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In-reply-to: nyssa@terminus.UUCP's message of 13 Aug 87 12:49:26 GMT

Posting-Front-End: GNU Emacs 18.41.4 of Mon Mar 23 1987 on bu-cs (berkeley-unix)



>This discussion about world hunger reminds me of the most disgusting
>facts about our world.  While people are starving to death in their
>billions  (Remember that *ten times* the population of the Unites States
>goes to bed hungry!), the EEC is worrying what to do about it's 
>mountains of butter and lamb, and its lakes of wine.  Here, our
>agriculture is running such a surplus that we've destroyed food.
>
>Is it any wonder that the third world hates us?

The problem unfortunately is the cost of distribution. It's expensive
to gather up that surplus food, pack it properly, ship it thousands of
miles to a needy nation and then provide overland transportation to
get it to where it's needed. Dealing with the local governments is
also a problem in many cases, sometimes for good reasons (eg. worries
about the general import problems of agricultural products such as new
diseases or bugs) and oftentimes not so good ("what's in it for me?")

I suspect that this is where (distribution) most of the famine relief
organizations spend a large part of their income rather than the
purchase price of the food itself.

	-Barry Shein, Boston University