The food crisis of 2008 had been threatening for a few years, mostly Essay - 1

The food crisis of 2008 had been threatening for a few years, mostly affecting the poor. A variety of causes but mostly man-made - Essay Example In this essay, the writer attempts to explicate that among variegated causes of food crisis are population explosion, mismatch of developmental priorities, environmental degradation and climate change. Population explosion The world has reached a population of 6.85 billion in the mid-year of 2010 and is estimated to reach 7 billion by the end of 2011 (Rosenberg, 2011). This increasing statistics of population could reach a peak that challenges the limited resources of the world. This situation is further compounded with massive influx of people from the rural communities, with whom nations relied for agricultural production, into the urban community in search for jobs that can immediately transform labor to money. Most of whom unfortunately dwell in ghettos and less conductive urban communities, except for those who were lucky to land in corporate jobs or in entrepreneurial initiatives. This rise of global population and anent urbanization trend, if uncontrolled, has serious implicat ion to food insecurity, mortality rate or severe malnourishment of children. It will generally affect the quality of life, delivery of social services, cause resource conflicts and increase of criminal rates and social malaise (Rosenberg, 2011). Thus, governments especially in developing countries have been advocating for reproductive health matters to limit populations in consideration to limited resources and services to be accorded to people. This is evidenced as crises are more felt in urban areas where people are vulnerable to volatile markets. On the other hand, rural communities are also confronted with difficulties in feeding their families with low income from farm produce against costly farm inputs and inflation (Lean, 2008) of prime commodities e.g. rice, sugar, oil and including skyrocketing prices of tuition fees in educational institutions, transportation and livestock’s food. Housing is incredibly a problem and albeit construction of villages, these homes are a ffordable only for those who have achieved a certain level of affluence to purchase properties. Indeed, increase of population means scaling up of utilization and maximization of resources, hence the wanton use of rainforests and wildlife. The inability to balance human needs and protection of environment presents detrimental condition—a world’s peril and damaging conflict of resource. Mismatch of Developmental Needs Recent developments made people grow grain to make fuel. Others raise crocodiles to fashion expensive bags. The worst side of this is that some countries are producing massive pineapples, mangoes, vegetation, rice and got best fishes only to be exported to rich countries while farmers, fishers and laborer were paid barely an amount for subsistence. In some developing countries, hug trees are cut to meet the construction needs of foreign nations while those who are leaving in logged sites content themselves with indigenous materials to live. People live in such irony. In United States, while there is recognition of decreasing wheat production as food in the last decades, whilst grain and oilseeds were also diverted for biofuel  production (US Department of State, 2009). Such impacted to the prices of wheat and rice just as how the use of palm oil for biofuel is affecting soybeans and vegetable oils’s pricing. This is further influenced by monopolistic capitals which dictate prices in the market and exacerbated the effects of inflation rates. There is therefore an urgent need to evaluate development programs

Demographics of Democrats vs. Republicans Research Paper

Demographics of Democrats vs. Republicans - Research Paper Example However, now that we are a month away from the presidential elections November 6th and the political arena seems to be on fire as Obama and Romney try to garner votes for their campaigns especially after their debate the last week, this made me curious and made me decide to conduct a research on the demographics of Democrats and Republicans. I know it’s not that important to many of us, but have you ever wondered which party has the highest number of highly educated members? Which is the dominant religion in the Senate? Or which party has the highest number of military men in the house? The tectonic plates of the American politics are shifting, and the demographic forces are reshaping the electorate and the major political parties. I have done some research on these parties and compiled the population characteristics of the 1) wealth (economic status), 2) education and intellect, 3) religion. A large number of Americans consider the Republican Party to be the party of the rich (Osterman, 28). Surprisingly the majority of the banks in America are in support of Romney based on their generous contributions to the Republicans. The investment bank is on the forefront having contributed $637,000, and JP Chase Bank, JP Morgan and Bank of America follow closely and as we all know banks are the hearts of our economic system. On the other hand, Democrats are supported by companies led by Microsoft, which has donated $419,000 for the elections campaign than Google and Harvard University. The wealthiest Americans are Republicans while the largest number of poor and middle-class Americans favors Democrats. Republicans are economically conservative, and their policies seem to favor the rich people and institutions such as the Wall Street (Levine, 27). The ideological centers of gravity towards the finance industry between the two parties are the causes of the wealth alignment.