In response to “Is this Hunger?” by Regular Joe

While reading his response to the “Hunger” contemplative practice, I noticed a pattern. “Regular Joe” thought about his own hunger, relayed it to the rest of the framework of world hunger, and tried to find solutions to the problem. This is a logical process for most (Identify problem with yourself –> expand to larger view –> look for a mend or solution).

To put it lightly, this process works for a lot of things, but world hunger is a different beast. It consumes the lives of tens of millions each year, most of which we don’t see because of our privilege. America is blessed with wealth, while other countries aren’t so lucky, so it is hard for us to think of hunger in a larger context.

A frame from Interstellar, a movie hypothesizing the future of agriculture.

To fight hunger in the present and in the future, I think we have to look to the past. In his claims, Thomas Malthus believed that human population/demand for food would far surpass supply of food in the coming decades or centuries. And while this could be a danger in the future, right now, Malthus was vastly mistaken overall. He saw around him a way of food production that was sloppy and downright slow by today’s standards, so no wonder he made this claim. But humanity, harnessing innovation, created numerous processes to optimize food growth, such as high-scale irrigation, crop rotation, genetically modified organisms, etc. These are some of the processes Regular Joe references in his response to “Hunger”, but I want to look at the future landscape of agriculture.

“Humanity is condemned by the tendency of population to grow geometrically while food production would increase only arithmetically”

-Thomas Malthus

To me, I look at the future of food production similarly to what I watched in the movie Interstellar, by Christopher Nolan. In this movie (taken place hundreds of years from now), the world has transitioned most of their citizens to agriculture-based careers, rather than accountants, athletes, movie-stars, etc. Because of the growing population, more food had to be produced, in areas that were optimal for food growth. I see the optimal growing zones on earth shifting more towards the poles (because of global warming) but I see humanity making the most out of it, squeezing all they can (agriculture-wise) out of their new situation.

References

Photo: https://www.cinemablend.com/news/2471590/how-interstellar-turned-christopher-nolan-into-an-actual-corn-farmer

Quote: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/are-malthus-predicted-1798-food-shortages/