Mark Bittman: More options for “solving” world hunger than biotechnology

“It’s been 50 years since President John F. Kennedy spoke of ending world hunger, yet on the eve of World Food Day, Oct. 16, the situation remains dire. The question ‘How will we feed the world?’ implies that we have no choice but to intensify industrial agriculture, with more high-tech seeds, chemicals and collateral damage. Yet there are other, better options,” writes New York Times opinion columnist Mark Bittman.

Bittman, an outspoken opponent of agricultural biotechnology and genetic engineering of monocrops as the end-all solution to solving world hunger, continues: “‘Feeding the world’ might as well be a marketing slogan for Big Ag, a euphemism for ‘Let’s ramp up sales,’ as if producing more cars would guarantee that everyone had one. But if it worked that way, surely the rate of hunger in the United States would not be the highest percentage of any developed nation, a rate closer to that of Indonesia than of Britain.”

Read the full, original story here: “How to Feed the World” 

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