starvation Archives - DOES GOD EXIST? TODAY

March 25, 2023March 22, 2023

Worldwide Food Shortages

One consequence of many things happening in the world today is that we have worldwide food shortages. In the United States, we complain about the price of food and how much it has risen. Yet, in places like Somalia, there is simply no food available.

COVID-19, the war in Ukraine, rapid population growth, climate change, drought, and escalating conflict have combined to cause starvation and poverty in many places in the world. The United Nations reports that 349 million people are experiencing acute food insecurity, up from 287 million in 2021. In Somalia, the number of people facing “catastrophic” acute food shortages has risen from 5.6 million in December 2022 to a predicted high of 8.3 million by June 2023.

All of this pain and suffering is not something caused by God. The refusal of humans to follow God’s instructions, along with human greed and selfishness, are driving the chaos and pain. However, it does afford opportunities for Christians to provide the food and water that people need. No atheist group is going to address this crisis. We have to be reminded of Christ’s statement in Matthew 25:31 -40 that providing the needy with food, water, clothing, and support is what He expects of His followers. Worldwide food shortages may offer an excellent opportunity to show people everywhere what authentic Christianity means.

October 28, 2021October 28, 2021

Hunger in the World and How Much Food Is Wasted

I added up the number of letters I received begging for financial help to address hunger in the world. I received 116 letters in September of 2021. They all displayed pathetic, horrible pictures of starving children, women holding emaciated babies, or men looking at barren fields due to drought or war. It is wonderful that people have set up various organizations to meet the pain and anguish of deprived people worldwide. But, the fact is that all of this shouldn’t be necessary.

The October 2021 issue of Scientific American contained a report of how much food is wasted. The article reports that 40% of all food produced is lost across the supply chain from farm to table. Each year 2.7 billion metric tons of food are lost—enough to fill 2,860 curbside trash tote bins every second. The article breaks down how much food is wasted in the various food groups, including seafood, meat, dairy and eggs, oilseeds and pulses, roots and tubers, cereals, and fruits and vegetables.

In addition to not meeting the hunger in the world, a significant amount of water and energy are wasted. We see skeptics complaining that if God existed, He wouldn’t allow this pain. Advocates of population control say the Earth can’t feed all of the people living on it. Some people have advocated eradicating the “unfit” mentally ill or physically incapacitated because they use resources that the “fit” need.

The fact is that God has blessed the Earth with the ability to produce more food than we can use with our present population. It’s human wastefulness and failure to wisely use God’s blessings that cause the pain and suffering of hunger in the world. Therefore, it is encouraging that various Christian organizations are working to prepare and transport food that would otherwise go to waste. They are also drilling wells and showing people in under-developed countries make better use of the resources available to grow crops and preserve food.

Matthew 25:35 shows Christ telling His followers that in the judgment, we will all be commended or condemned partly based on how we met the need of others. “Then shall (Jesus) say to those on his right hand ‘Come you blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: For I was hungry, and you gave me food. I was thirsty, and you gave me drink.’” The passage goes on to show people asking when they did those things, and Jesus replied, “Inasmuch as you have done it to one of the least of these my brothers, you have done it to me” (Verse 40).

Let each of us support works that address the issue of hunger in the world and the shortage of clean water. That may mean directly supplying those essentials or helping people in undeveloped areas of the world learn how to make better use of what God has given them.

Reference: “Massively Reducing Food Waste Could Feed the World” in Scientific American October 2021, pages 77-78.

September 2, 2021September 1, 2021

Feeding Starving People

Every day, the mail brings letters from organizations asking for money for feeding starving people around the world and in the United States. Most of these organizations are directly or indirectly connected to the teachings of Christ. I don’t get letters from atheists who feed hundreds of people who don’t have enough to eat. When Jesus gives a picture of the judgment scene in Matthew 25:31-46, the first thing He says is that His followers will provide food and drink to the needy.

As the population of planet Earth grows, the need for food will only increase. God has provided the means to feed our population. More than that, we could double our population and still have enough for everyone to eat. Hunger results from waste, mismanagement, greed, selfishness, and failure to live as God has called us to live.

Science has learned some superfoods are untapped or poorly managed. One example is the lowly chickpea. Chickpeas provide more than twice as much protein as corn and more than four times as much fiber as brown rice. In addition to providing nutrition for people, chickpeas enrich the soil with nitrogen so that farmers can use less fertilizer. Botanists have developed new varieties of chickpeas to grow in harsh conditions and even fight off blights. These new varieties allow farmers in Africa and Asia to double their yields.

John the Baptist ate locusts and honey according to Matthew 3:4. Worldwide, people eat more than a thousand species of insects. Insect farming is in its infancy, but grasshoppers, rhino beetles, and termites are the three most common insect food sources. Not only do insects provide all the nutrition that a human needs, but the cost of raising bugs is microscopic compared to cattle, sheep, chickens, and pigs.

Potatoes are an essential crop for feeding people, and the top potato producer is China, with an annual harvest exceeding 150 million tons. No matter what climate changes we see in the coming years, chickpeas, insects, and potatoes can withstand the extremes. God has provided the resources for feeding starving people to make desperate hunger a thing of the past. Humans just need to learn to get along and use all the resources God has given us.

Data from National Geographic articles by Nancy Shute from 2010 to 2021.

February 17, 2021February 16, 2021

Food Shortages and Starvation

One of the frustrating parts of the world situation today is the waste of food. Nearly every day, we get letters from relief organizations about hunger and pictures of starving children. The fact is that God has given us a planet that produces more food than we humans can eat. Food shortages and starvation result from mismanagement and failure to use all that God has given us.

The World Resources Institute tells us that 35% of the food produced in North America goes to waste. Most of this waste occurs at the consumption level in our homes and restaurants.

Some farming practices also contribute to the waste problem. In our area, people grow watermelons. When harvest time comes, hundreds of melons are left in the field to rot. The problem is that what sells at the market is melons of a specific size and weight, so melons that don’t meet those criteria are left in the field. Green beans are grown here, and the machines that harvest the beans cut off the plants allowing only one harvest. If allowed to continue to grow, the plants would produce many more beans.

Also, people are not fully using many food resources. We are just beginning to see the use of insects as a food source. Another developing area is aquaculture used for farming fish, as well as shrimp, clams, and lobsters. God has given us adequate food resources, and it is up to us to use them wisely so we can end food shortages and starvation everywhere on the planet.

February 27, 2020February 26, 2020

Can We Produce Enough Food?

Some have said that this is the only command of God that humans have fully obeyed. Whether that is true or not can be debated. There is also debate about whether there is enough food for the enormous population of humans inhabiting this planet. Every day organizations trying to stop the hunger stalking our planet send us heart-breaking pictures of starving people. Did God err in commanding humans to multiply and then not providing enough food? Can we produce enough food for the population with what God has given us?

The February 3, 2020 issue of Time magazine carried a pictorial article about “planet-friendly eating.” The article highlights companies that are producing food from plants and insects. Some of the companies are:

1) Exo sells what they call “Cricket Protein Bar” and roasted crickets. They say that crickets are the perfect protein source, high in essential amino acids, B12, and iron.

2) Plenty grows salad greens indoors with wind and solar providing power. They plan to add strawberries to their production line.

3) Just (which was formerly known as Hampton Creek) produces an egg substitute from mung beans. You can buy it at Walmart.

4) Mosa Meat grows meat from animal cells cultured in a bioreactor. It won’t be practical until the cost can be reduced unless you want to buy a $280,000 hamburger.

5) Beyond Meat bypasses the animal cells to produce burgers and sausage from peas, beans, rice, and sunflower seeds. You can buy their product at thousands of grocery stores.

6) Odontella uses algae to produce a product with the texture and flavor of salmon. They call it Solmon, and it’s available in vegan grocery stores in Europe.

7) Huel makes drinks that are supposed to have the nutrition of a meal with 27 essential vitamins and minerals as well as protein, fat, fiber, and phytonutrients.

8) Solar Foods uses microbial fermentation of nutrients, water, and carbon dioxide to produce protein that resembles wheat flour.

Can we produce enough food using these new techniques? These ideas are encouraging because plants and insects can be grown inside so that pesticides or herbicides are not needed. Cultivation can be automated, reducing the massive overhead of conventional agriculture. Add to that, the fact that much of the food grown outside is wasted by pests, war, pollution, unpredictable weather, and bad agricultural practices.

American tastes may take a long time to adapt to these new foods, but a starving child in Africa is not concerned about how the food was produced if it satisfies hunger and provides nutrition. God has given us the means to produce all the food we need, but greed, waste, and ignorance have led to starvation and misery.

June 21, 2019June 20, 2019

Mental Illness and Teen Euthanasia

On June 2, 2019, a 17-year-old girl named Noa Pothoven starved herself to death. She had endured a long battle with mental illness resulting from multiple rapes at ages 11 and 14. It was her second attempt to end her life by starvation. Last year, medical personnel placed her in a medically induced coma and used a feeding tube to keep her alive. This time her parents respected her wishes and allowed her to die. This case brings up many issues about mental illness and teen euthanasia.

This incident took place in the Netherlands where assisted suicide is legal for troubled children as young as 12 “providing there is strong medical evidence that psychiatric conditions have made their lives ‘unbearable.’” It is wrong to assume that any human can get to a mental state that is 100% hopeless and that they cannot be helped by any treatment. Ms. Pothoven was very vocal about her pain and frustration. She wrote an autobiography titled Winning or Learning (Winnen of Leren in Dutch) to describe her anguish. She had 10,000 Instagram followers and shortly before her death she told them,“After years of fighting and fighting it is finished.”

There were numerous mistakes in the way people handled this young woman’s case. At age 11, she was raped at a school party where there should have been adult supervision. She was raped again by two men at a teen party at age 14. She was ashamed to tell her parents about the rapes, and she never reported them to the police. The trauma from those rapes resulted in periods of being housed in group homes and mental hospitals. She was turned away by a Dutch euthanasia clinic and she was on a waiting list for radical treatments such as shock therapy. Finally with the cooperation of her parents, she refused all food and drink and passed away at home.

By applying Christian love and principles of caring, people can be helped, even with conditions like this young woman. If Christian love and caring had been applied from the beginning, she would not have gotten into that condition. Human life is precious and sacred, and even severe conditions of physical or mental illness do not change that fact. Mental illness and teen euthanasia are serious matters and we hope that she does not set an example for her 10,000 Instagram followers.
— John N. Clayton and Roland Earnst © 2019

Reference: There are numerous reports of this incident on the internet. Just search for Noa Pothoven.

October 23, 2018October 22, 2018

Does Earth Have Enough Food?

Does Earth Have Enough Food?
When God put the first man upon the Earth, He told him to take care of the garden–to dress it and keep it (Genesis 2:15). We have not done a very good job of keeping the Earth, and the result has been disastrous in a variety of ways. When Noah left the Ark, God told him, “Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. As I gave you green plants, I give you everything.” (Genesis 9:3). Did God give us enough? Does Earth have enough food to feed our growing population?

The first point we need to make is that we waste most of the food we grow. Various research groups give different estimates of what percentage of our food is either discarded, spoiled, or not harvested properly. All studies of this topic have shown numbers indicating that we waste more than 75% of the food that is available.

One area where we do not use food efficiently involves plants and animals that grow at astronomical rates. Some fish and water invertebrates can produce many thousands of eggs from a single female. The Ocean Conservancy has called attention to the growth rates of mahi-mahi, an ocean fish found in both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. That species offers a vast supply of meat for harvesting. In one year of growth, the mahi-mahi can attain a length of over four feet, and the fish can reproduce as early as four months of age.

God has provided a wide variety of food sources for us. Does Earth have enough food to feed a growing population? Yes, we do have the potential to produce enough food for all people on Earth to eat. World starvation issues are due to our failure to develop food resources and to our massive waste of food. It is not because God didn’t give us enough to supply our needs.
–John N. Clayton © 2018
Data from Splash published by the Ocean Conservancy for Fall 2016, page 3.