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Through the wonderful website of “Website World Hunger: 5 Simple Ways that You Can Help” by Miss. T of Prarie Eco she explains how every individual can do their part. Through this blog this semester, I have realized that many of the international world hunger issues, such as Africa, are really underrepresented in the sources of Western media. Rarely in American media do people see stories of international hunger in Africa. The big story that I found was this winter when people in Europe were freezing to death due to the bitter cold.

What if there was more news on African hunger? You or I can’t help the undercoverage of this issue but there are five very simple ways that you can help this issue!

1. freerice.com – you play simple word games that gain rice fed to starving countries. There are many different opportunities in daily life that offer things similar to this. For instance, this year in my church back home they had rice bowls that individuals collected through the season of Lent and then on Easter returned it to the church. This is was a little carboard rice bowl with a hole in the top. The primary objective was to put your spare change in the bowl to feed hungry individuals.
2. thehungersite.com – you simply click and it donates a cup of rice to an international country. This is a simple way that everybody could take a few minutes to do. Imagine the possibility of donations if there was an international hunger force day?
3. Help at home – Africa is not the only place where hunger is happening. I know that there are many food pantry places in Bowling Green. If any students have any leftover mealplan at the end of the year they should make sure to donate nonperishable food items to a pantry! For instance, there is a food pantry on Thurstin Avenue at Saint Thomas Moore. You can either drop off items during church, in the office or volunteer in your free time to the service work of handing out food.
4. You can help by volunteering your time or donations to any events or charity!
5. You can also ask your local politicans to see what they are doing about internationa hunger problems.

There are simple ways that we can all work together on this issue!

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This woman has been sitting at an airport in Spain for three weeks trying to stop the hunger in the Africa. I found an article from BBC that talks about how into three weeks of her hunger strike that she is refusing medical attention. A Western Sahara woman in Spain named Aminatou Haidar is an activist trying to spread her message out to the world. I found this article of international news in the BBC and did not find any stories that were revelant to any Mrs. Haidar in any American newspaper.

Much of Spain was extremely interested in this woman especially man figures or celebrities in the Spain media. This instantly gained attention by international news. BBC quotes that, “For 22 days now she has refused any food and has only drank sweetened water.”

She said that she would not eat until there was justice. How could this one woman get so much attention in the media? Why was there less media in the Western culture?

Could this woman really change the world if somebody did this in America? Does the media really pick up on it? I am interested in activists and what they have to do in the journalism world. I think that sometimes they are frequently ignored in the Western “one way lens” point of view. I have been reading through the news for many projects, quizzes and gotten into a regular habit of attempting to get more into local and international news. However, in the international news information that I have sought, there is literally no coverage of any hunger in any countries.

South Africa has been known as one of the countries that may suffer from hunger the worse but the Western international news does rarely cover any international hunger stories.

What impact could this really have on our perception of the international hunger issues?

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African Silent Hunger

I found this video that was percieved through the American media of international hunger forces. I was wondering if the argument really truly works for this cause? We have all seen those commercials before where you see the poor animals that have been used. But in the context of the enormous struggle of hunger for millions of individuals in Africa, does the emotional appeal of the argument really work through the international news media?

I find that too often there are these arguments made that simply do not work. I believe that the emotional argument proves to be faulty and does not work in this context.

How does this video make you feel? Does this video really make Americans want to help with an international news devastation? In America we always see on the news the American Red Cross having call in donations at a center.  However, through America’s international news system it is not clear that there are any rallies or programs that assist places outside of America. What would be an effective way to communicate this message or argument?

Recently, there has been the “Africa Hunger Appeal 2012.” This Appeal is held by Hong Kong and they are trying to defeat African hunger partically in the Eastern section of Africa. I was really surprised by this website because it is extremely recent information. The website shows how the drought of 2012 has made hunger problems even worse in East Africa. This website has gained a lot of attention from the media and it has became a huge factor in assisting Africa in 2012.

This website is so extremely intriguing to the people who would like to donate to end the problems of world hunger. I really liked this website because it provides you with information about exactly where the donations go to end the issues of world hunger. For example, five hundred dollars in Hong Kong currency can provide a child with three months of food. It is amazing to see all of the statistics that this website has to offer.

According to the website, Hong Kong along has raised over two million dollars to assist with the deadly 2012 droughts in Africa. The only interesting thing about the drought of 2012 is that there is no website from America. The international countries have several places where individuals can help with the drought in Africa. The media has been extremely undercovered in this event. The Hong Kong website discusses how there is nearly no other donations being made towards this cause.

Why would the worst drought of East Africa in the past century not even be slightly reported in the American international news system?

I was blown away by this website and how much they are trying to assist the country of East Africa.

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If you think about it, American culture throws away food all of the time. I know that once every few weeks I will clean out my fridge and I am sometimes really shocked to see everything that I am throwing away. However, Benson states that the amount of food thrown away in America is enough to overfill a professional football stadium. Think about how many people this could feed in an instant. There is over 295 billion pounds of food thrown away by America each year (naturalnews.com). Through earlier blog posts, there is over a billion people starving internationally. If Americans could somehow be more conscious about what food they throw away, this would amount to giving every starving individual in the world almost thirty pounds of food.

What effects could the media have on this? Benson explains that there have been foodwaste rallies for international hunger. I think it is remarkable that there are organizations out there that account for how privileged we are as Americans and how we can actually toss food away on almost a daily basis. I think that this is absurd.

The media should find a way to portray this to the individuals of America. What impact do you believe that this could have on the world of international hunger?

I love to think sometimes how much the little things that they we do not even realize we are doing; think about how these little things could truly change the world. Next time you throw away food think abou the starving children in Africa and try to figure out the media can fill the country with these football stadiums that are filled on a daily basis.

Benson, Jonathon. “Daily Amount of American Food Waste.” Natural News. 17 Oct. 2011. naturalnews.com.

Through the bread of the world organization they explain that over sixteen thousand children die on a daily basis from international hunger (bread.org). Think about if there was an event in media where sixteen thousand children in a single instance. Take for example maybe a suicide bombing where this enormous amount of children are brutally killed. One of the worst ways to die is starvation. The media and journalists would be all over a single event where sixteen thousand children died. Why would they not report continously on something where sixteen thousand children daily?

Through the bread.org program they have an organization that is called Poverty-Focused Government Assistance. The government of America is trying to help with the facts of international hunger but not so much the actual people of America. The website goes on to say that there are almost a billion and half people that live on less than a dollar and a quarter a day. Think about how much Americans spend daily on just all of our commodities? If every American donated five dollars this would probably fix the problem of world hunger for years.

What I really liked abou the media of bread.org is that they are centrally focused on international hunger. The mission statement is that they need to urge government officials to take more action. Is it the hands of the government or the people?

Recently, I read the book On Record: Israel-Palestine Conflicts: How the New York Times Misreports Conflicts by Friel and Falk. Through reading this novel it is learned that America favors Israel and many important part of Palestinian life are simply left out. This was a wonderful and interesting novel but it got me thinking about how newspapers cover international hunger issues. I found it very interesting that the coverage of international hunger is not misreported or misrepresented in the New York Times. Through researching their databases of newspaper articles I was shocked to see how many different articles there were pertaining to international hunger.

According to the newspaper, there are over a billion and half people that are yearly added to the world hunger list (nytimes.com). I found this surprising that they added that this number is still growing every single year. The newspaper does a great job explaining how this will never simply go away and how it is getting worse and worse with time. Similarly, the Times reports many wonderful statistics and does not seem to favor any certain side of the issue. The research provided by the newspaper comes from the World Hunger Forces which was really interesting to me. I like how they have statistics that are accurate and very depicting.

I am glad to say that America’s newspapers are at least portraying the fact that there are billions of starving people out in the world. Lastly, when I went to a friend’s house the week before Easter I saw that they had a “rice bowl.” My friends said that they got it through the church and that only ten cents provides developing countries with a bowl of rice. I really surpised by this and thought that it was a great idea for giving to others in service on the week of the Easter. I went to church Easter weekend and was really shocked to see how many little bowls where you dropped change in were collected. There must of have been at least a hundred of them.

Say that the New York Times wrote an article about the rice bowl. I think that many people have never heard of this idea before and it is simply to keep and add up change in. Through this project what if the newspapers really put this into the media? Do you think that the rice bowl could truly change the world of international hunger if it was put into the media systems?

Source: Lewis, Paul. “International Hunger Still Growing.” New York Times. 2001. nytimes.com

When an individual thinks about the international issues it is common that they will always first think of the commercials. The commercials are only using the images to persaude their argument which makes it not always effective. The audience often experiences emotional attachment but it is actually not the most important issue in donation to the cause. Charities are not the number one resource for solving international hunger. Additionally, the amount of voluntary aid does not even come up as the number one resource. Often with international hunger companies like American Red Cross which are aid are always trying to improve.

The most important part of international hunger is how the media percieves it. The amount that the media covers the diaster is how the most funds are raised. The only problem with this is that it applies to media talking about diasters. However, why isn’t the fact that there is a starving country always in the media? I think it the media – especially television news and newspapers did more with international hunger than this might be solved. I think that this could instantly solve the issue. What would happen if a huge newspaper – such as the The New York Times  integrated one weekly page about African hunger? What impact could this have on this issue?

I think that it would be absolutely remarkable. I never truly thought that the media could impact an issue like this so much. The media shapes how we define “sexy” and tells consumers what to buy but never really goes in depth with real issues. I believe that if America truly wants to help other countries that the media should focus more on international hunger.

Source:

Olsen, G. R., Carstensen, N. and Høyen, K. (2003), Humanitarian Crises: What Determines the Level of Emergency Assistance? Media Coverage, Donor Interests and the Aid Business. Disasters, 27: 109–126. Print.

“One year after the release of “We Are the World”, organizers noted that $44.5 million had been raised for USA for Africa’s humanitarian fund. They stated that they were confident that they would reach an initial set target of $50 million.[61] By October 1986, it was revealed that their $50 million target had been met and exceeded; CBS Records gave USA for Africa a check for $2.5 million, drawing the total amount of money to $51.2 million.”

“The global economy might be reeling from the shakeout on Wall Street, but two of the world’s richest businessmen are vowing to spend tens of millions of dollars more — not on bolstering their own companies, but in helping the world’s poorest. With Congress locked in talks over a mammoth bailout package, Bill Gates and Howard Buffett (Warren’s oldest son) announced at the United Nations on Wednesday that their private foundations will plow more than $75 million into helping small farmers in Africa and Latin America to sell their crops as food aid — a move which could potentially overhaul the decades-old — and often criticized — global food aid system.”

If there has been over 125 million dollars donated to Africa through world hunger, why is that not enough? How expensive is food? I think that there would be companies that would produce massive amounts of food and sell it cheaper.

I know this is short but I found it extremely interesting. Where is all this money really going? How much money would it take to end world hunger per year?

Source: http://www.insidehoops.com/forum/showthread.php?t=183374

There is an awesome article about a man named Dick Gregory. In 2009, he went on protest for African Hunger in the United States. Dick Gregory would have hunger strikes the overwhelming and devasting African hunger. Dick Gregory will always be rememered in activism as the African American man who fought for African hunger. This one man is now famous and the media widely advertized what he dd.

I thought about this today. What if other people did this? If there was a movement maybe for one week – of a large group of people on hunger strike would it really change anything about African Hunger. It would be interesting to see if a large group of Americans fasted for maybe three days think about how much donation this would recieve.

Every American eats on average at least two or three meals a day. On average for middle class Americans you spend around five dollars per person roughly on food a day. With three days of no eating the individual for three days this would fifteen dollars. If there was a group of Americans, maybe a hundred thousand who could do this, it would remarkable! This would be a million and half dollars to donate to charity for African. Imagine if just for one day you got a million Americans to do this. What it would create? Could we really ever change the world?

What impact could the media have on this remarkable event? If the media put out this information in newspapers, online news and television and made this for one day, I think it would have remarkable amounts. Could other international countries have this same media attention?

Information found from: dickgregorycharity.com

The Food and Argiculture Organization of United Nations recognizes the fact that international hunger is decling, but there is still an unacceptable high amount of international hunger happening. They quote that since 1990, international hunger has only improved by twenty-five percent. Does this mean that the issue will ever really be fixed or is it just going to continue to very slowly decrease?

However, it is important to note that in the past twenty years, this was the biggest decline in history for the International Hunger issue. Does this mean that we are on the right track? What else needs to be done to improve this more.

Even though it is still unreasonably high, I think we need to recognize that at least this issue is not getting worse. According to the Organization there was over one billion starving individuals in the world twenty years ago, but as of 2010 there are only 925 million. Does this mean that the media is working to improve this?

The media has to have somepart of the decline because there did not use to be much media on this issue until recently. This ensures that the media is doing the correct thing for this international devastation.

Addtionally, as of today at noon, there is over seventy thousand pounds of wasted food. How did we get access to everybody and realize that the food needs to be evenly distributed?

Source: Stopthehunger.org

According to, “From Hunger to Hope,” foundation, there is over fifty million dollars spent annually on fighting world hunger (Fromhungertohope.com). This produces over hundred and twenty-one million pounds of food and it is estimated that only twenty-five dollars can feed a child for over half of a year. If this is the case, then why are there still so many starving children in the world?

I think that the distribution of the food is the major problem because there are still millions out there that are starving every day. No matter how many money donations are made towards the fight against world hunger,will it ever will stop the issue? Can money really solve all of the world’s problems?

This is from the hungertohope.com and this explains how the donations truly assist a child in need:

The 2012 Hunger Statistics show that Africa is the second most international starving country. I found this surprising because I do not believe that most Americans knew this. Furthermore, they described the international hunger problem as, “The world produces enough food to feed everyone. World agriculture produces 17 percent more calories per person today than it did 30 years ago, despite a 70 percent population increase. This is enough to provide everyone in the world with at least 2,720 kilocalories,” (worldhunger.org).

Did you know that there was actually ENOUGH FOOD TO FEED EVERYONE? I don’t think that most people who are interested in international hunger knew that there is actually enough food to feed everyone. The only problem is how do we feed all of these people? Why is there enough for everybody but some do not get it?

So is distribution the problem? Can media and journalism fix this? What do you think?

I found an interesting article at “IFRC.org” which is a website for Intenational Red Cross by Katrina Crew. Everybody knows that through the media, the red cross is frequently on televisons, newspapers and on the local news. They are huge activists to end worldwide hunger but they usually have the same example of, “you can feed a child for only fifty cents a day.” I thought that this new approach to ending worldwide hunger, can really change through the media and journalism.

Katrina Crew of the Internation Red Cross believes that if everyone if Africa, which is rapidly growing in mobile communications, has a cell phone, then this can assist in fighting world hunger. Crew explicates that, “If mobile companies could improve access further then people’s lives can change. A mobile phone gives you access to information –you can find out that your goat is worth more money than the middleman is offering, meaning you have better access to food, medical care, and education”, (www.ifrc.org). I think that is remarkable how much mobile communications can drastically change the economy and the hunger problems in Africa. Who would have ever thought? Do you really agree with Crew?

I believe that Africa could have remarkable changes with this new innovation. It is also noted that mobile phones would help stimulate the economy because individuals would be allowed to send money through the phone. Journalists say it is only time until Africa will completely change and the fight to world hunger will soon be over.

I thought that this was an interesting perspective of portraying the world wide hunger issue because it is so atypical. I liked how it was not just the common reponse of showing starving children on the television. It shows that media and journalist are truly interested in solving the issue and coming up with new, intergrative and interesting ways to solve this issue!

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