Food Wasted Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Food Wasted - Research Paper Example These figures are extremely significant when one would consider the fact that millions of people all over the world, including some Americans are currently facing starvation or poverty. As per the 2009 statistics from America, 14.3 percent of all persons lived in poverty (Poverty in the United States). â€Å"How can 50 million people face hunger in a country that wastes billions of pounds of food?†(Feeding America). This paper analyses the reasons and consequences of poverty and food wastage in America. According to Usborne, â€Å"28 million people in the US will be using government food stamps to buy essential groceries in the fiscal year 2008, the highest level since the food assistance program was introduced in the 1960s†. United States is supposed to be the wealthiest countries in the world. Yet, it is surprising to know that 28 million people in America are facing some kind of poverty. It is an accepted fact that American food production is more than what they requ ired for the food needs. In fact America is exporting surplus food items to overseas countries. Yet, a substantial portion of the Americans are facing starvations. This happens mainly because of the problems in the management of food chain in America. â€Å"There is enough food to feed every man, woman and child in America. Hunger in America is not about supply, it is about redirecting the excess food that is lost each year to those who need it most† (Feeding America). Tons in millions of food items are wasting in American warehouses because of the problems in the supply chain. In fact the major reason for starvation is not lack of production, but inadequate supply of food. According to Bloom, 49 million food- insecure Americans were there in 2012. This happens mainly because of the food damage that taking place in between farm and fork. Dana Gunders (p.1) pointed out that 10 percent of the total U.S. energy budget, 50 percent of U.S land and 80 percent of all freshwater reso urces were utilized while food production take place in America. In her opinion, 40% of the total food production in America is getting wasted nowadays. Another argument put forward by Dana is that uneaten foods and the foods thrown away as waste are contributing heavily to the environmental problems in the form of solid waste accumulation. Solid wastes have the ability to generate toxic gases such as methane. In her opinion, reduction of food losses by 15 percent would be enough to feed more than 25 million starving Americans every year. It should be noted that the governments all over the world are spending too much to avoid environmental damage. The objective of these spending is to keep the environment fresh always to make life of animals, human and plants safer. It is a fact that plants are the only food producers in the world and no other thing in this world has the ability to produce food. Because of this awareness, governments are trying hard to fortify plant life in this wo rld. However, dumping of wasted food in agricultural lands is causing huge problems to the plants in the form of solid waste. It should be noted that solid wastes have the ability to produce toxic gases such as methane which is harmful to plant life. â€Å"When food is disposed in a landfill it rots and becomes a significant source of methane - a potent greenhouse gas with 21 times the global warming potential of carbon dioxide. Landfills are a major source of human-related methane

Journalism - The Economic Crisis Research Paper

Journalism - The Economic Crisis - Research Paper Example The people I interviewed gave varied responses to the causes of the economic crisis but from the interviews it was clear that it affected people’s living standards since inflation hit hard ion people s pockets and they could no longer live the way they used to do before. People feel that the economic crisis was caused by the debts that most people in the United States live with. The rate of profit of the economy had fallen and this meant that there was a high rate of inflation. Businesses were forced to adjust to the crisis by laying off workers so that they could continue being in existence. The rate of unemployment also increased as a result and this meant that the unemployed people could not get money to meet their daily needs. The decline in profits cased investments to reduce and since the economy depends on returns from business, the economy was set on the crisis. Other people feel that mortgage lending caused the economic crisis since the cost of housing increased signi ficantly during the crisis. This is because people had to pay a lot of money for their housing units and they were left with little money to meet their other needs. People feelings about the economic mess are varied but most people feel that it ruined the lifestyles as they had to budget their finances so that they could be able to survive with the money they had. ... The crisis caused people to move in to smaller houses since paying mortgages was expensive as interest rates were on the all time high and paying them was a task. People feel that the government is to blame for the crisis since it did not set the necessary policies to see that the value of the dollar is maintained. The government did not respond to crisis early enough as if it had it would have set out policies that would ensure that interest rates are at a good enough level to further development. People are dependant on credit and when the interest rates are too high, it means that they will not be able to get credit at reasonable interest rates hence levels of poverty will increase. Had the government ensured that interest rates were at a fair rate, it would make people get more credit and use it for their own development and for that of the country. People feel that government spending also had a great role to play in the crisis the economy was so much in debt and the high rate o f inflation meant that more money had to be used to pay the debt. The government spent a lot of money on the war against terrorism and there was no money being injected into the economy from the war. The cost incurred during the war depleted the economy of funds, which could be used for development purposes. Everyone was affected by the crisis and people complained on the adverse effects it had on their daily routines. There were high rates of unemployment since businesses could not employ people due to the decreased levels of profit. Those who were lucky to get jobs had to work on two or more jobs since they could not get enough from one job. Since the cost of gas also increased people’s travelling habits also