“The Reproach of Hunger”

The chosen book is "The Reproach of Hunger," written by David Rieff and released in 2015 in New York City. The most notable effect of poverty highlighted in the book is hunger. This is because people who are hungry often have little choice but to eat, which forces them to spend a significant percentage of their income on it. In other instances, hunger may be seen as a sign of poverty rather than a problem that needs to be addressed separately, suggesting that the country's food supply may not even be a factor in the solution to the hunger crisis. In this wordy book, David Rieff does not realize this key point in fighting against hunger. The author posits that the rise in international food prices, in 2008, marked the beginning of structurally spiked prices for foodstuffs. In Rieff’s discussion, major emphasis is centered on whether a solution should be found for extra food production in the technocratic philanthropy, international agribusiness, or the groundbreaking politics. This only makes his solutions to be unpromising, which in the end leaves him with a question, “Where does this leave us?” (Rieff, 2015).

If this is a hopeless fight, David Rieff tries to get other alternative solutions such as “the strengthening of the state and in the promising and the burden of democratic politics.” In the book, he talks about the successful Brazilian’s Zero Hunger plan, which lowered the nutrition deficiency problem through the structuring of the malnutrition problem as a political issue instead of a technical one. This is evident in the quote “a matter of social justice and a state’s obligations to its citizens.” In this quote, David foretells the increased hunger crisis in different parts of the world that demand that something is done quickly before it gets out of hand. The book also continues to claim that the food prices are bound to keep rising because of the climate change as well as change problem that is making food production to be lower (Wheeler, 2013). Rieff disagrees with the claim that the reason for hunger is because of the high value of the meals but because the income earned by the people are derisively lower than expected. In this case, the book tries to pose a challenge to the world in that there needs to be a change in the income of the lower socioeconomic demographics in all the parts of the world which will help them in fighting against hunger as well as other forms of poverty. From his false evidence, David Rieff moves into the broad field of agricultural debates that are entirely passionate as well as insightful on the topic of study. However, if the primary focus is to be put on the different ways that are to be employed in helping the needy to raise their incomes, then Rieff’s three solutions may be very right as well as helpful.

The transformation of the earnings made by the low life people needs a change to be done on their productivity-people are poor because their hard work is most of the times unproductive which does not help them in fighting the problem that is facing them. Most of the well-established institutions, as well as people, are the ones who are out to taste the miracles of productivity. The book claims that more significant levels of poverty exist because in some nations such organizations or people are few in numbers implying that only a small fraction of the poor are hired. The book also goes on to claim that insufficiency of such companies and people is less likely to be resolved by the technocratic philanthropy or global business. Instead, they will present these nations with another mean of resource extraction (Otto, 2015). The paper claims that it is only the groundbreaking politics that has more significant ability solve the hunger problem among the developing countries. It also argues that Failing societies just like the failing families, each fail in their unique way.

The book also suggests that failing states are at risk of continuing to flounder if they do not find a stable domestic politics that is focused on developing the economy. It also argues that technological philanthropy can play a significant role in global business. It gives the example of Myanmar which has for a long time been categorized as a failed state in the world’s highly developed region. The nation has enjoyed significant benefit from the diplomatic reputation of the area. The book also points out the struggle that Rwanda faces in attracting tourists to itself because of its small economy. Therefore, Rwanda either needs global philanthropy to better its entry into the various business. This is because it pictures international market as its primary enemy and the public money as its very solution. On the other end, corporate income money becomes the enemy and the global industry the direct answer to it. All these forms try to shadow each other in that none is a better solution for the problem. Therefore, Rieff puts a lot of focus on food supply which then makes him go blind and overlook the other ideologies that do contribute to the persistence of hunger problem in the nation.

The book is about poverty and hunger problem that is affecting most of the developing nation in the world today. The book offers a variety of reasons why there is an excellent hunger issue among the countries despite the many efforts that are being made by the individual states. The author believes that the developing nations, as well as people, fail to tackle the central problem of hunger by only focusing on the food supply part and overlooking the other factors that can contribute to the problem. The writer is of the opinion that if the poor are given better ways of increasing their incomes, then they would be in better position to fight the hunger problem correctly without any question. The author does provide a balanced evaluation of the evidence to support his main point that it is through the use of revolutionary politic and not technological philanthropy that will help in curbing the problem entirely. The author also asserts that it is the low incomes that are earned by the people that make them fail to service all their food needs thereby causing the problem to continue. The main problem that persists is the increase in the cost of food products which the author believes is due to global warming and climate change.

The book offers a more up to date information on the rising problem of poverty and hunger in different parts of the earth. The book check on the social, economic, political, and even technological factors that may be contributing to the rise of the problem. It is better in the identification of the issues as it also considers the environmental factors such as global warming and climate change that have resulted in low production which in turn has seen the cost of buying food products rise drastically despite the efforts being put to make sure that it is within controllable levels. The most amazing factor is that it emphasizes on the significance of revolutionary politics in changing the issue for good which is far better than the previous books which only based their solutions on ways of increasing food supply without having the other factors in mind.

David Rieff excellently writes the book. This is because of the smooth follow of ideas about poverty that continue to arise one after the other thereby making the reader to have an easy time following them up as well as deciding whether they thoroughly cover the problem professionally. For instance, the author uses a real-life example of developing nations that have employed different tactics to help curb the problem that is facing their country. For example, he points out the Brazilian scheme of zero hunger that resulted in the fall in the malnutrition levels in the country. He also uses Myanmar which has used its regions political reputation to deal with its issues (Randel, 2015). On the other hand, the author points out the problems that Rwanda is facing in trying to attract tourists. Such examples make the book more compelling to read by any person as the ideas are present in the most straightforward possible manner that any individual can understand. The arguments are convincing because they focus on real-life issues such as global warming and climate change. It is apparent that climate change deleteriously impacts the food product and in turn results in a fall in production despite the hard work done by the people thereby causing the cost of foodstuffs to be high. This is a phenomenon which every individual in the world understands very well, and therefore they can easily relate it to all that the author is trying to bring out. Lastly, the focus on revolutionary politics is also compelling because it comes at a moment people are tired of bad policies, and they are set to bring strategies that will help them lead a better life than that they had in the past years.

Therefore, I must say that the book is handy to all the people who are out to find solutions to the hunger and poverty problem that is tearing apart our societies. These people would benefit from a wide range of information that would, in turn, help them to realize their dreams of eradicating poverty in the world today and help the people have a better life (Ehgartner, 2017). In that case, I would be moved to buy it involuntarily because of the information that is offered by the wise author. I would also recommend it to my friend as well as any researcher who seeks to find vital information on the hunger problem. This will help me in handling my project this term as there are a lot of information on hunger that I can use to base my plan.

References

Ehgartner, U., Gould, P., & Hudson, M. (2017). On the obsolescence of human beings in sustainable development. Global Discourse, 7(1), 66-83.

Otto, I. M., Biewald, A., Coumou, D., Feulner, G., Köhler, C., Nocke, T., & Volkmer, I. (2015). Socio-economic data for global environmental change research. Nature Climate Change, 5(6), 503-506.

Randel, J., German, T., & Ewing, D. (2015). The aging and development report: poverty, independence, and the world's older people. Routledge.

Rieff, D. (2015). The Reproach of Hunger: Food, Justice, and Money in the Twenty-first Century. Simon and Schuster.

Wheeler, T., & Von Braun, J. (2013). Climate change impacts on global food security. Science, 341(6145), 508-513.