Nobel laureate Amartya Sen weighs in on the food crisis in the NY Times:
Though the need for huge rescue operations is urgent, the present acute crisis will eventually end. But underlying it is a basic problem that will only intensify unless we recognize it and try to remedy it.
It is a tale of two peoples. In one version of the story, a country with a lot of poor people suddenly experiences fast economic expansion, but only half of the people share in the new prosperity. The favored ones spend a lot of their new income on food, and unless supply expands very quickly, prices shoot up. The rest of the poor now face higher food prices but no greater income, and begin to starve. Tragedies like this happen repeatedly in the world.
This is very much a demand-driven story in line with Sen’s research on the human causes of famine. But is it the right one?
Contrast this argument with Tom Slayton and Peter Timmer’s account, where hoarding, speculation, and trade restrictions take much of the blame. Indeed, the release of Japanese rice supplies last week eased speculation and price pressures. Rice prices are coming down.
In Congressional testimony, Arvind Subramanian also points to high fuel prices, stagnant agricultural productivity, and climate-change induced pressure on agricultural supplies.
Sen is undoubtedly right, but the contest between the haves and the have-nots is only a piece of the story.
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Update: Rice prices tumble as Cambodia lifts its export ban (via CGD)
I’m an artist and working on a project on hunger — I’ve become intrigued with this quote about seven meals as a title for a piece of work and I found your blog as I was doing some research on this statement. It sounds like you are questioning the efficacy of this sentence — can you elaborate on why you don’t like it? It seemed like a pithy way to say how fragile existence is for people living in poverty — but perhaps there is more going on than I realize. I’d appreciate hearing more! Thanks!