Food Shortages: A Global Crisis, Part 1 of 2

Our Mother Earth can supply more than enough food to feed everyone on the planet, but we’re facing a global food crisis. The World Food Programme (WFP) says, “2022 is a year of unprecedented hunger.” As many as 828 million people go to bed with empty stomachs every night. From 2019 to 2022, the number of people facing acute food insecurity grew from 135 million to 345 million. The world is hungrier than ever. Humanitarian organizations estimate that one person dies of hunger every four seconds, and approximately 50 million people in 45 countries are teetering on the edge of famine. On today's program, we’ll highlight global food shortages and their causes in various parts of the world.

According to the World Health Organization, climate change is humanity's most significant health threat. Climate change contributes to extreme weather events, including hurricanes, typhoons, floods, wildfires, heat waves, and droughts that directly impact people’s lives across the globe and trigger food shortages and famine.

In 2022, arid conditions and heat waves reduced crop yields, especially wheat harvests, in some of the world's leading producers, with an estimated 4.7 million tons less wheat being produced in the EU than last year. Last summer, heat waves of 40 degrees Celsius, or 104 degrees Fahrenheit, impacted more than one billion people in India and Pakistan and destroyed 10 to 15 percent of their crops.

“There is one person dying from hunger every minute across Ethiopia, Kenya, and Somalia.” “There is a risk that about 58 million people in Africa might go hungry, mostly because of a combination of those factors, a factor of increasing climate change, but also then increasing prices that make whatever is available outside of the reach of most people.” In South Sudan, unprecedented flooding and localized drought have destroyed homes, crops, and lives, causing nearly two-thirds of the population to face acute hunger.

Over the years, Supreme Master Ching Hai (vegan) has expressed Her deep concern about global hunger. “In many corners of the world, hunger is already a reality. It's a daily reality. And not just today, but for long. It's just getting worse nowadays, more obvious.”

Supreme Master Ching Hai (vegan) has long advised farmers to switch to vegetable cultivation to increase the food supply since God arranged for the Earth to provide enough food for all in this way.