So apparently there are loads of organisations which strive to aid world hunger. Let’s get this bit out of the way first: Yes, it’s awesome that these organisations do this. It’s empathetic and no doubt hugely appreciated by those suffering from hunger. I’m not against helping people in need.

However, I’m not sure providing food is really the right way to go about the problem. Food is a finite resource and as such helps control population. A population generally won’t grow beyond the extent that the food in that geographic vacinity supports, or at least, if that does happen, it very quickly shrinks back to a size that the food supply does support (it has to…)

This in mind, I think it could actually be harmful in the big scope of things to be bringing food from elsewhere into the affected area. It allows otherwise impossible reproduction to occur and in the end you get twice as many hungry people. On a forum I read a good analogy which is, throwing litres of gasoline onto a house fire in hope that the fire will be happy to feed on the gasoline instead of your house. The more people that throw food at this problem, the more food we will need in the future.

This problem needs a more elegant solution. I am not here to give that solution. I’ve dumbed down the problem significantly in order to spin this view on it so any solution I could come up with would probably be too shallow. I just thought it’s an interesting topic and this is an interesting perspective to take.