Society
Jean Ziegler
Why the World Still Goes Hungry
The 21st century is called the era of abundance, and the amount of food wasted is unfathomable. So why hasn’t hunger gone away? And why has the gap between the rich and poor increased? Eliminating hunger is the assignment given to humanity that should have been completed by now. To Jean Ziegler, there’s only one way to see this abdication of duty: “A child dies from hunger every five seconds. Every child who dies from hunger is a child murdered.”
Lesson Plan
- Lesson Length : 6 Lessons ㆍ 1 hours 21 miutes
- Language : 한국어, English, 简体中文, Spanish, French, 日本語
How to finally eliminate world hunger.
According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, there were over 810 million people going to bed hungry in 2020. That means one out of ten people in the world struggle to find enough food every day, not to mention the billions more lacking access to proper nutrition. Experts have had decades to come up with a solution. And yet, why are there still so many people who are starving? You might assume the existence of hunger is an inevitable part of the world in which we live; however, Jean Ziegler, the UN’s first Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food and an expert on famine, says “hunger shouldn’t be called inevitable. It should be called a massacre.”
It is a complete tragedy that people are starving to death in this age of food abundance where so much is thrown away. How can people still lack access to enough food when mountains of food are wasted daily? Jean Ziegler says if we breathe the same air as those who go to bed hungry, we have a responsibility to help them. And he also asserts that there are specific reasons why underdeveloped countries are trapped in a cycle of hunger and poverty. There are people to blame for this unequal social structure, and thus, if tackled at its roots, the problem of hunger can be solved in a day. How does he make these bold statements with such confidence?
Jean Ziegler shares with us his ideas on the direction we should take, the path for humanity, as we find the best way for us all to live together on this planet. Can we indeed overcome these deep-rooted systemic issues of hunger and poverty?
Full Bio
Jean Ziegler
- Betting on Famine: Why the World Still Goes Hungry
- Hatred of the West
- The Swiss, the Gold, and the Dead
- Former vice-president of the Advisory Committee to the United Nations Human Rights Council (2008~2012)
- UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food
- Member of the Swiss Parliament for the Social Democrats (1981-1999)
- Professor of Sociology at the University of Geneva (1972-2002)
Jean Ziegler is a practicing sociologist who has fought to eradicate famine for more than half a century. He is a former professor of sociology at the University of Geneva and the Sorbonne, Paris, who served as the vice-president of the Advisory Committee to the United Nations Human Rights Council.
While serving as a member of the Swiss Parliament, he published a book, Swiss Whitewash, and exposed the realities of Swiss banks’ transactions of black money which he claims is the cause of the inequality in the world. Because of the book’s contents, he was stripped of the privilege of exemption from liability and was on the receiving end of many accusations and even death threats. Despite all the opposition that he faces, he continues to fight for those struggling with hunger and poverty.
He served as the UN’s first Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food and was the vice-president of the Advisory Committee to the United Nations Human Rights Council. He published many books revealing the realities of hunger and the inequalities caused by capitalism, including Hatred of the West, which received numerous awards for its scathing take on the failings of Western governments to address pressing social issues such as world hunger.
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Society
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