Are we eventually going to run out of food? That’s the question in the minds of most world food bodies.
Close to 30 million people face hunger and starvation in Southern Africa and the Horn of Africa. In Southern Africa the worst drought in a decade, coupled with the devastating socioeconomic impact of AIDS, has caused drastic food shortages. In the Horn of Africa, 14.3 million are at risk of starvation due to a prolonged drought that has seriously affected agricultural and livestock production. In both regions of Africa, crops have dried-up in the fields and desperate families are selling all they have, including precious livestock, to buy food. Prices for the dwindling supply of available food in the market have soared.
Particularly hard-hit have been the poorest and most vulnerable, especially the elderly, children, AIDS-affected orphans, the chronically ill, and pregnant and nursing women. To compound the disaster, the HIV/AIDS pandemic has ravaged these communities, affecting many of the people who ordinarily would have been the most economically productive.
Southern Africa has the highest HIV/AIDS prevalence rates in the world. In some countries, more than 30 percent of the adult population is infected. HIV/AIDS impacts food security and nutrition in many ways. Young and strong people fall ill and are unable to farm or earn wages. Family members are pulled away from income generating and farming activities as they care for others with the disease. Parents die leaving orphans to be supported by extended families (often grandparents) creating a situation where there are many mouths to feed and fewer wage earners. This agricultural, social and economic disaster is affecting more than 14.6 million people in Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
In the Horn of Africa chronic drought is a continual problem in the region. In Ethiopia, due to poor spring rains and the late arrival of fall rains, the country’s harvests produced a mere 20 percent of last year’s yield. In Eritrea the situation is also severe with agricultural outputs 60 percent below their normal levels. With 14.3 million people at risk of starvation, the year 2003 could become a crisis of similar magnitude to that of the 1984 famine.
Let’s take a look at how the Online media covered the food crisis affecting Africa.
BBC
This website has looked at the current food crisis in depth. It has looked at various aspects of the food crisis. There is a map which takes a quick glance into the countries affected by crisis. There is a video. It also looks at different regions, specifically looking at why the region is currently facing this crisis. There is an in depth analysis.
CNN
This website does not look at the crisis in depth, like BBC. It does not have a video. But the blog section regarding the food crisis is very interactive. The story on the webpage is concise with the all the latest happening regarding the food crisis.
The Times
I like the angle that The Times took. It gives a positive spin to the food crisis in Africa.
Al jazeera
This website has a good coverage.
Sabc.com
Sabc looked at the Efforts in place to ease crisis. But the webpage is not user-friendly. The picture used on the webpage compliments the story but the story itself is not updated. Its not very interactive for Online users.
CONCLUSION
Overall the online media has covered the issue really well and in depth…. But the question remains … Are we going to run out of food? Well not for now. But the people living in poverty … their plight has gotten worse. As if a bear market, credit crunch, energy crisis and city financing emergency were not enough for one year, experts say the world is now facing down the barrel of the worst catastrophe of all: famine. The very idea that the modern world could run out of food seems ludicrous, but that is the flip side, or cause, of the tremendous recent increase in the cost of raw wheat, corn, rice, oats and soybeans. Food prices are not escalating because speculators have run them up for sport and profit, but because accelerating demand in developing nations, biofuel production and poor harvests in some areas have made basic foodstuffs truly scarce.
In energy circles, folks who warn about the beginning of the end of cheap fossil fuels talk about “peak oil” as a point we have dangerously and expensively crossed. Likewise, you can now add “peak wheat” to your political and investment lexicon. And it’s a lot worse.
