We all know that poverty/hunger will never end, but what is the best way to reduce it?

Question

In the Asian, African and Latin American countries, well over 500 million people are living in what the World Bank has called "absolute poverty"

Every year 15 million children die of hunger

For the price of one missile, a school full of hungry children could eat lunch every day for 5 years

Throughout the 1990's more than 100 million children will die from illness and starvation. Those 100 million deaths could be prevented for the price of ten Stealth bombers, or what the world spends on its military in two days!

The World Health Organization estimates that one-third of the world is well-fed, one-third is under-fed one-third is starving- Since you've entered this site at least 200 people have died of starvation. Over 4 million will die this year.

One in twelve people worldwide is malnourished, including 160 million children under the age of 5. United Nations Food and Agriculture

The Indian subcontinent has nearly half the world's hungry people. Africa and the rest of Asia together have approximately 40%, and the remaining hungry people are found in Latin America and other parts of the world. Hunger in Global Economy

Nearly one in four people, 1.3 billion - a majority of humanity - live on less than $1 per day, while the world's 358 billionaires have assets exceeding the combined annual incomes of countries with 45 percent of the world's people. UNICEF

3 billion people in the world today struggle to survive on US$2/day.

In 1994 the Urban Institute in Washington DC estimated that one out of 6 elderly people in the U.S. has an inadequate diet.

In the U.S. hunger and race are related. In 1991 46% of African-American children were chronically hungry, and 40% of Latino children were chronically hungry compared to 16% of white children.

The infant mortality rate is closely linked to inadequate nutrition among pregnant women. The U.S. ranks 23rd among industrial nations in infant mortality. African-American infants die at nearly twice the rate of white infants.

One out of every eight children under the age of twelve in the U.S. goes to bed hungry every night.

Half of all children under five years of age in South Asia and one third of those in sub-Saharan Africa are malnourished.

In 1997 alone, the lives of at least 300,000 young children were saved by vitamin A supplementation programmes in developing countries.

Malnutrition is implicated in more than half of all child deaths worldwide - a proportion unmatched by any infectious disease since the Black Death

About 183 million children weigh less than they should for their age

To satisfy the world's sanitation and food requirements would cost only US$13 billion- what the people of the United States and the European Union spend on perfume each year.

The assets of the world's three richest men are more than the combined GNP of all the least developed countries on the planet.

Every 3.6 seconds someone dies of hunger

It is estimated that some 800 million people in the world suffer from hunger and malnutrition, about 100 times as many as those who actually die from it each year.

Answer 1

There's nothing to be done about it. People have always been selfish and they don't care if they have more that they can spend - they will never give away what they have in excess. The thing is to be one of those that are well-fed and not on of the poor.

Answer 2

Unequal distribution of resources is one root cause.
Though solving this is difficult and will take many solutions.
There is only so much to go around and if one person/family/nation takes more than their share they have taken it from someone else even if not directly.
People get mad at Capitalism for pointing this out...
As employment goes...
Not every body in the diverse human family is born with the skills to excel in the particular society they were born into. This is especially true of western culture which fits the inherent personalities of only a few. Everyone has something to contribute, but is not able to contribute.
People got mad at Communism for pointing this out.....
People in a bureaucracy do not know the needs of others and are forces to work in a tunnel of information. When people are not in charge of their own resources they get mismanaged. Power corrupts, creates rationalizing and apathy.
People get mad at Anarchism for pointing this out
Each ism has tried to solve poverty, but I think it will take a combination of them and more to work.

There is only so much drinking water. The more we use it for things like concrete, flush toilets, development etc, the less there is. Now by the time it gets back to our wells it is poisoned, and each time before it gets to our tap we must use more and more chemical to make it safe. Chemicals we drink. This is not sustainable.
We have farmers destroy food crops every year for "economics". Poison it so gleaners can not have it. Restaurants and grocery stores throw away sickening amounts of food.
In most case charity has its heart in the right place but goes about it wrong. We should spend our charity funds on re-creating sustainable societies and stock piling aid only for disasters. Put all our efforts into looking at each situation individually and solving the root problem, which is usually environmental/social.
There would be no to little real "poverty" if we lived in parts of the world suitable for human habitation and sustained a world that had clean water in rivers for everyone, materials for homes local and abundant, food growing literally on trees.

Give a man a fish he will eat for a day. Teach him to fish he will eat for a lifetime, till someone kills or “owns” all the fish.

Poverty stems from profit and bureaucracy.

Answer 3

The economic system has to change into one where we remove the large gap between those with a lot of spending power and those with very little spending power. Every time a rich man spends money on luxury goods, he is helping luxury goods manufacturers redirect resources that could otherwise have been used to produce goods for the average person.

The market economy is only able to determine what everyone needs when spending power is relatively equal. When some people have much greater spending power (for example, because they exploit their employees), they can afford to hire away the labor and raw materials that the poor need. That's why in today's economy, poor people are asked to grow flowers and coffee rather than food. Rich people already have enough food and you can't sell to other poor people, because they can't afford to pay, so you have to resort to satisfying the less important needs of those who do have the money to pay you.

Answer 4

When you go from talking of the USA to other countries, it is a bit hard to say "WHY" they go hungry. Some people choose not to "help" the suffering, whatever help may mean in *your* own mind. There are many people, myself included, who can do more, and do not. We (meaning humankind) are of the flesh and like to appease ourselves before we help others.
Is it correct? No. Will it ever change? Only when Jesus Comes back~ and only then.
If USA STOPPED sending money to help other countries, we could help ourselves. Then when other countries cry saying they need help, we can then say, "Sorry, you never wanted us before, why do you want our money now?"
It is sick how much money we pour into other countries (and then they tell us to leave) when we could be helping our own elderly, poor, impoverished etc people. YES- we are to help other ppl as it says in the Bible (*MY* belief) but in the same respect, when you GIVE someone a handout, they most likely just take it and come back for more. Teach that same person the job of *getting* the handout (vocational schooling help, shopping sensible, job training, growing food etc) and they are more likely to not need that HANDOUT again~
The old saying of "Give them a fish and they will take it, teach them to fish and they have a livelyhood" makes all the sense in the world....
I think ANYONE who gets free aid of ANY SORT should have to do community service work (except the elderly who can not) to offset the cost and learn the value of ethics and most importantly life skills. This way, roads can be picked up, groceries can get bagged in food surplus stores, pencils can get pushed for paperwork- again a win/win situation.
My heart breaks for the suffering children, who are not at fault for being born...
I also believe sterilization can and should be enforced for those who cannot afford to care for their kids and keep having more.
Thank you for bringing this up to us, we all need to realize we can and should do more, myself included. ><>

Answer 5

It is time, past time, to tackle the problem of over-population, but the effort must be made.Of course religions are going to have to stop trying to out-breed each other and may have to be ended altogether. They have out-lived their usefulness anyway.
Humans, unfortunately, are a lot like rats, feed them, and you just get more rats. The whole social structure of the planet will have to be modified to curb the "need to breed" and education must become universal. We must start now, there is no choice.

Answer 6

It is imperative at this time to drastically reduce the number of new people being born into such societies. Anyone who claims otherwise is part of the problem. Feeding the starving is a first step, but it should come with help for other problems as well.

Answer 7

Serious hunger exists in places ruled by dictators and gangsters.

People are perfectly capable of feeding themselves when their "leaders" leave them alone to do just that.

Answer 8

Build Wal-Mart Super Stores in all 3rd world countries.

Answer 9

cannibalism