Food crisis: The time has come to do something

21/01/2011
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I shall relate a bit of history.
 
When the Spanish "discovered"us five hundred years ago, the estimated  population on the Island was no more than 200,000 inhabitants who were living in  harmony with nature. Their main sources of food came from the rivers, lakes and  seas rich in protein; they were also carrying out a rudimentary form of  agriculture that supplied them with calories, vitamins, mineral salts and fibre.
 
In some regions of Cuba they still have the custom of making casabe, a kind  of bread made from casaba. Certain fruits and small wild animals rounded off  their diets. They used to concoct a beverage with fermented products and they  brought to world culture the rather unhealthy habit of smoking.
 
The current population of Cuba is possibly 60 times greater than the one  existing then. Although the Spanish mixed with the native population, they  practically exterminated them by making them work in the fields as semi-slaves  and by the search for gold in the river sands.
 
The native population was replaced by the importing of Africans captured by  force and enslaved, a cruel practice that was applied during centuries.
 
Of great importance for our existence were the eating habits that were created.  We were turned into consumers of pork, beef, lamb, milk, cheese and other  by-products; wheat, oats, barley, chickpeas, kidney beans, peas and other  legumes coming from different climates.
 
Originally we had corn and sugar cane was introduced among the calorie-rich  plants.
 
Coffee was brought in by the conquistadors from Africa; cacao was possibly  brought from Mexico. Both of these, along with sugar, tobacco and other  tropical products became enormous sources of resources for the metropolis after  the slave rebellion in Haiti that occurred at the beginning of the nineteenth  century.
 
The slave-based production system lasted in fact until the transfer of Cuban  sovereignty by Spanish colonialism to the United States, in a bloody and  extraordinary war where Spain had been defeated by the Cubans.
 
When the Revolution triumphed in 1959, our island was a true Yankee colony. The  United States had duped and disarmed our Liberation Army. One couldn't speak of  developed agriculture, but of immense plantations exploited on the base of  manual and animal labour that in general used neither fertilizers nor machinery.  The great sugar mills belonged to the Americans. Several of them had more than  one hundred thousand hectares; others were tens of thousands of hectares in  size. All together there were more than 150 sugar mills, including those  belonging to Cubans; they were working less than four months a year.
 
The US received Cuban sugar during two great world wars, and had conceded a  sales quota on its markets to our country, tied in with commercial commitments  and limitations on our agricultural production, despite the fact that sugar was  in part produced by them. Other decisive branches of the economy such as the  ports and the oil refineries were American property. Their companies possessed  huge ships, industrial centres, mines, docks, maritime and rail lines along with  public services as vital as the electric and telephone systems.
 
For those who want to understand, that's all you need.**
 
In spite of the fact that the necessities of rice, corn, fats, grains and other  food production were important, the United States was imposing determinate  limits on everything that was in competition with its own domestic production,  including the subsidized sugar beet.
 
Of course, in terms of food production it is a real fact that within the  geographical limits of a small, rainy and hurricane-beset tropical country  bereft of machinery, dams, irrigation systems and adequate equipment, Cuba could  not have the resources, nor did it have the conditions to compete with the  American mechanized productions of soy, sunflower, corn, legumes and rice. Some  of these, such as wheat and barley could not be grown in our country.
 
It is a fact that the Cuban Revolution has not enjoyed a moment of peace. The  Agrarian Reform had barely been passed, before the five-month mark of the  revolutionary triumph had been reached and the programs of sabotage, fires,  obstruction and the use of harmful chemical measures were begun against our  country. These even came to include pests to attack vital productions and even  human health.
 
By underestimating our people and their decision to fight for their rights and  their independence, they committed an error.
 
Of course, none of us at that time possessed the experience collected during  many years; we were taking off from fair ideas and a revolutionary conception.  Perhaps the main error of idealism that was committed, was to think that in the  world there was a determinate amount of justice and respect for the rights of  peoples when, certainly, it didn't exist at all. Nevertheless, the decision to  fight wouldn't depend on this.
 
The first task taking up our efforts was to prepare for the struggle that was  coming up.
 
Experience acquired in the heroic battle against Batista's tyranny showed that  the enemy, no matter what his strength, could not defeat the Cuban people.
 
The country's preparation for the struggle turned into the people's main effort,  and it took us to episodes that were as decisive as the battle against the  mercenary invasion promoted by the United States in April of 1961, the landing  at the Bay of Pigs escorted by the US Marines and Yankee planes.
 
Unable to resign themselves to the independence and exercise of the sovereign  rights of Cuba, the government of that country adopted the decision to invade  our territory. The USSR had absolutely nothing to do with the triumph of the  Cuban Revolution. The Revolution did not assume a socialist nature because of  support from the USSR; it was the other way around: support from the USSR was  produced by the socialist nature of the Cuban Revolution. To such a degree,  that when the USSR disappears, Cuba keeps on being socialist.
 
By some means, the USSR learned that Kennedy would try to use Cuba with the same  method that they had applied in Hungary. That led to the errors committed by  Khrushchev in regards to the October Crisis that I saw the need to criticize.  But it was not only Khrushchev who made a mistake, so did Kennedy. Cuba had  nothing to do with the history of Hungary, and the USSR had nothing to do with  the Revolution in Cuba. This was the sole and exclusive fruit of the struggle  of our people. Khrushchev merely made the brotherly gesture of sending weapons  to Cuba when it was being threatened by the invasion that was organized,  trained, armed and transported by the United States. Without the weapons sent  to Cuba, our people would have defeated the mercenary forces as it had defeated  Batista's army and occupied all the military equipment it possessed: 100,000  weapons. If the direct invasion of the United States against Cuba had occurred,  our people would have been fighting right up to the present time against its  soldiers, who would surely have had to fight against millions of Latin  Americans. The US had committed the greatest mistake in all its history and  perhaps the USSR would still be in existence today.
 
Hours prior to the invasion, after the cunning attack on our air force bases by  US planes painted with Cuban insignia, the socialist nature of our Revolution  was declared. The Cuban people fought for socialism in that battle that passed  into history as the first victory against imperialism in the Americas.
 
Ten US presidents have come and gone, the eleventh is now passing through and  the Socialist Revolution is standing firm. Also coming and going were all the  governments that were accomplices to the crimes of the United States against  Cuba, and our Revolution is standing firm. The USSR has disappeared and the  Revolution moved forward. It didn't take place with the permission of the  United States; instead it is being submitted to a cruel and merciless blockade;  with terrorist acts that took the lives or injured thousands of people, whose  authors today enjoy total impunity; anti-terrorist Cuban fighters are condemned  to life sentences; a so-called Cuban Adjustment Act concedes entry, residence  and employment in the United States. Cuba is the only country in the world  whose citizens have that privilege, one that is denied to Haitians after the  earthquake that killed more than 300,000 persons and the rest of the citizens in  the hemisphere, those being persecuted and expelled by the empire.  Nevertheless, the Cuban Revolution stands firm. Cuba is the only country on the  planet that cannot be visited by US citizens; but Cuba exists and stands firm,  only 90 miles away from the United States, fighting its heroic fight.
 
We, the Cuban revolutionaries, have committed errors, and we shall go on  making mistakes, but never shall we make the mistake of being traitors.
 
Never have we chosen illegality, lies, demogoguery, duping the people,  pretence, hypocrisy, opportunism, bribery, the total lack of ethics, abuses of  power, including crime and repugnant tortures which, with obvious albeit  doubtlessly worthy exceptions, have characterized the conduct of the presidents  of the United States.
 
At this moment, humankind is facing serious problems without precedent. The  worst is that to a large degree the solutions shall depend upon the richest and  most developed countries, the countries that shall reach a situation which they  are really in no condition to face unless the world they have been trying to  mould for their egoistic interests crumbles around them and which inevitably  leads to disaster.
 
I am not speaking about wars, whose risks and consequences have been transmitted  by wise and brilliant people, including many Americans.
 
I am referring to the food crisis originating in the economic facts and the  climatic changes that are apparently now irreversible as a consequence of the  actions of man, but which, at any rate, human minds are under the obligation to  face in a hurry. For years, which was really time lost, the matter was being  talked about. But the country which emits the greatest amount of polluting  gases in the world, the United States, was regularly ignoring world opinion.  Leaving protocol and the other customary stupidities of the men of state in  consumer societies to one side, things that the influence of the media usually  bewildered them with once they came into power, the reality is that they didn't  pay any attention to the matter. An alcoholic, whose problems were widely  known, and I don't need to name him, imposed his line of thinking upon the  international community.
 
The problems have suddenly taken shape now, through the phenomena that are being  repeated on every continent: heat waves, forest fires, losses of harvests in  Russia, with many victims; climate changes in China, excessive rainfalls or  droughts, progressive losses of water reserves in the Himalayas threatening  India, China, Pakistan and other countries; excessive rainfall in Australia that  have flooded almost a million square kilometres; unusually harsh and  unseasonable cold waves in Europe that have considerable impact on agriculture;  droughts in Canada; unusual cold waves there and in the US; unprecedented rain  in Colombia affecting millions of farming land; never-before seen rainfall in  Venezuela; catastrophes caused by excessive rain in the great cities of Brazil  and droughts in the South. There is practically no region in the world where  such events have not taken place.
 
Productions of wheat, soya, corn, rice and other numerous grains and legumes  that make up the food base of the world -- whose population today according to  calculations totals almost 6.9 billion inhabitants, now coming close to the new  figure of 7billion, and where more than one billion are suffering from hunger  and malnutrition -- are being seriously affected by climate changes, creating a  very serious problem in the world. When reserves have not been totally  recovered or just partially in some items, a serious threat is now creating  problems and destabilization in many States.
 
More than 80 countries, all of them in the Third World, already having difficult  problems of their own, are being threatened with real famines.
 
I shall limit myself to quote these statements and reports, in a summary  fashion, which have been published in the last few days:
 
"The UN is warning about the risk of a new food crisis.
 
"January 11, 2011 (AFP)"
 
"'We are facing a very tense situation'…" FAO corroborates.
 
"Some 80 countries are facing a shortage of food..."
 
"The global rate of prices for basic agricultural products (grains, meat, sugar,  oleaginous and dairy products) is currently at its highest level since FAO began  to use that index rate 20 years ago."
 
"UNITED NATIONS, January (IPS),"
 
"The UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO), with headquarters in Rome,  last week alerted that world prices for rice, wheat, sugar, barley and meat […]  would undergo significant increases in 2011…"
 
"PARIS, January 10 (Reuters) - President Nicolas Sarkozy of France shall be  taking his campaign to confront the high global food prices to Washington this  week …"
 
"Basel (Switzerland), January 10 (EFE).- The president of the Central European  Bank (BCE), Jean Claude Trichet, spokesperson for the governors of the central  banks of the Group of 10 (G-10), today cautioned about the strong rise in food  prices and the inflationist threat in emerging economies."
 
"The World Bank fears a crisis in the price of foods, January 15 (BBC)
 
"The president of the World Bank, Robert Zoellick, told the BBC that the crisis  would be deeper than that of 2008."
 
"MEXICO DF, January 7 (Reuters)"
 
"The annual rhythm of inflation for foods has increased threefold in Mexico in  November as compared to two months ago..."
 
"Washington, January 18 (EFE)
 
"The climate change will aggravate the lack of foods, according to a study."
 
"'Since more than 20 years ago, scientists have been alerting about the impact  of climate change, but nothing is changing other than the increase in emissions  that cause global warning', Liliana Hisas, executive director of the US  affiliate of this organization told EFE.
 
"Osvaldo Canziani, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007 and scientific  advisor for the report, indicated that 'in the entire world meteorological  episodes and extreme climatic conditions are being recorded, and increases in  average surface temperatures are exacerbating the intensity of these episodes'."
 
"(Reuters) January 18, Algeria is buying wheat to avoid shortages and unrest.
 
"The State grain agency of Algeria has bought around 1 million tons of wheat in  the last two weeks to avoid shortages in the case of unrest, a Ministry of  Agriculture source informed Reuters.
 
"(Reuters) January 18, Wheat shows a strong gain in Chicago after Algerian  purchases."
 
"The Economist, January 18, 2011
 
"World alert due to food prices"
 
"Among the main causes are the floods and droughts caused by climatic changes,  the use of foods to manufacture bio-fuels and speculation in commodities  prices."
 
The problems are dramatically serious. However, all is not lost.
 
Current calculated wheat production reached almost 650 million tons.
 
That of corn surpasses that amount and nears 770 million tons.
 
Soy could come close to 260 million tons; of this the US calculates 92 million  and Brazil 77 million. They are the two greatest producers.
 
The general data on grains and legumes available in 2011 are well-known.
 
The first matter to be resolved by the world community would be to choose  between foods and bio-fuels. Brazil, a developing country, shall of course have  to be compensated.
 
If the millions of tons of soy and corn being invested into bio-fuels are routed  towards the production of foods, the unusual rise in prices would cease and the  world`s scientists would be able to propose formulae that might in some way or  other halt and even reverse the situation.
 
We have lost too much time. The time has come to do something now.
https://www.alainet.org/en/articulo/146955?language=en

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