Abstinence makes the heart grow fonder

I went on to the BBC news website, as I do regularly, because I needed to check some information about another posting that I am writing. This article caught my attention.

In previous postings, I have been critical of the US over the way they (the US Government) promote abstinence as a means of providing HIV prevention and promoting sexual health. It goes beyond that promotion, as the US government has been refusing funds for any health programme that does not follow this ridiculous policy.

While I respect that Americans have the right to follow their own path, this imposing of their pie in the sky ideals upon the rest of the world is criminal. There are people in Africa who are infected by HIV as a direct result of this policy. Further, most of the conflicts in Africa have at there root over population, something that would have been reduced had the NGOs not had their funding cut by the US. Also the US cut development aid to all countries that did not follow this ridiculous abstinence policy.

Well as this article shows the US has been following this policy themselves and it has not been working. With one in four American teenagers with an STD, Sexually Transmitted Disease, for the health of America this ridiculous abstinence policy has to change.

The simple fact is that the US, under Bush has been imposing an ultra religious policy upon the rest of the world.

It does not take a major leap of imagination to see the actions of these ultra religious people, imposing their will upon the rest of the world mirrors the way that ultra orthodox Muslims are trying to impose their prospective upon the rest of the world. Further, what is also true of both is that they have subverted the messages of peace and tolerance of both religions.

At least the world knows that Bush will be going soon. However who ever takes over will have the mess that Bush and Co have left behind, not just in America but in the rest of the world.

Food and Population Follow up - Plan A? Or Plan B?

Following my posting about Food shortages and Population growth, a rather interesting comment was made. Sometimes when I am writing about something I feel so passionately about, I can occasionally say something that is not as clear as intended. Often as I am writing a stream of conciousness, although many of my readers may say that is more a stream of unconsciousness, I don't always provide the clarity that I aim for.

Additionally, I do try to hard to be diplomatic at times. This posting and the comment are a classic example. Personally, I think that as a result of Climate Change, there will not be the projected increase in the global population. In fact I we will soon start to see population decline. That will be as a direct result of food shortages giving rise to famine and to put it bluntly, people starving to death. This is not alarmist as it is already happening. This occurs not from lack of food, but from poverty. As I stated in my previous posting, eight hundred and fifty million people will not get enough food today. That is nearly three times the population of the USA, or over fourteen time the population of the UK. The reason for choosing these two countries as examples is that in both enough food per day is thrown away that would feed the underfed the under nourished and the starving. I thank my contact in the UN for clarify the situation in the US.

Now if we cant feed the world now, how can we hope to feed the a growing population? Add in to that the difficulties of a changing climate and the whole concept of a population reaching nine billion looks impossible.

Put quite simply without the political will to distribute food fairly now, the population will not grow as fast as projections estimate. In the natural world food and water is the limiting factor regarding population size. Therefore without the food or the capacity to grow the food the human population will never reach the projected twelve billion humans on the planet. Personally, the way that we in the west are dealing with the problem will result in the global population falling. In nature, no population like ours can be sustained. Further in biology, any cell or group of cells that grows out of control is called a cancer. Is that the way humanity wants to be remembered, as a cancer on the planet?

That brings me on to the main are that I need to provide clarification on. Currently in the developing world there is a crisis brought about by HIV/AIDS. So many of the solutions that the western developed world has proposed or has been prepared to fund, involve preaching abstinence. I use the word preaching quite deliberately, as while intellectually I can see that if we got the whole world to stop having sex would stop HIV/AIDS, it is just not going to happen. Via this naïve and frankly ridiculous policy, inspired by religious morality, it has condemned millions in Africa alone to grow up with out parents. In some parts of Africa the HIV+ rate is as high as forty percent of the adult population. Had the religious busy bodies kept their noses out, we would have seen twenty years of good family planing, far lower rates of infection not just of HIV+ but of other STD and lower birth rates.

While I am not saying that family planning is the only solution here, for the last twenty years the interference from religious groups has done more harm than good in providing development to the countries of Africa. Yet where non judgemental healthcare and education has occurred, in Africa and Asia, it has not only helped stem the spread of HIV infections it has helped reduce the birth rate.

The one aspect that all of the NGOs (Non Governmental Organisations) agree on though is that educating women really helps. Even organisations like Oxfam, the UN Food and Health programmes and many others don't fully understand why, but it seems that by even teaching women something as basic as the ability to read and write, helps empower women to access information regarding women's health issues and in particular information regarding family planning. That helps reduce the size of the families. Put simply the fewer children the families have the lower the financial cost. Further, there is also lower child mortality rates in the families where the woman has been educated.

We in the Western developed world just don't realise just how easy we have it, and just how difficult it is in other parts of our planet. However the real point is, that had we not tried to impose our morality upon other people and cultures, it is possible that we would not now be facing the projected growth of planets population to such unsustainable levels.

While I am not advocating any form of forced population control, if people in the developing world were provided with the education and choice, most would use family planning as they see it as the most sustainable way out of poverty there is.

The trouble is so far we have not even tried plan A so no one has thought of a Plan B.

Global Food System Must Change Population and Food

Here is a mind boggling fact;

There are more human beings alive on the planet today then have ever lived in the whole of human existence.

Human population is the elephant in the room when it comes to climate change and the environment. Not least in the moral abhorrent image of genocide sparked by raising the issue. Thus, very few governments, will actually even discuss the issue. Or when they do they only talk about it in economic terms, such as the so called demographic time bomb. That's where with an ageing population, there are fears that we will not have enough new workers entering the job market to pay the taxes that will enable a government to pay for the health and social services. Even then it is only in terms of increasing the population further.


This prospective of only seeing people as economic units, consumers and or as producers is very short sighted. As quite simply a constantly growing population requires more resources: Food, Water, Shelter and Warmth. These are the basics of life, no matter if you live in the developed world or in the developing world. The problem is that at a global population of six and a half billion we cant get this right, so how are we going to cope with nine billion? Or even the twelve billion that is the expected peek?

I have constantly tried to write a posting on this topic of population growth, but I kept on getting sidetracked. I now understand why, it is simply that I can not see it happening. It is not that I can envisage that many people on the planet, but that I can not see how the this can happen without the already stressed natural systems breaking down.

Even if you take out of the equation the likely effects of a changing climate, the two key elements are food and water. Water and food poverty are already serious issues around the planet. People are already starving, 850 million people will not have enough food to eat today. With another two or three billion mouths to feed, how will we grow that food?

Already the over use of non organic chemical fertilisers has created a run off into the oceans creating dead zones. Therefore, if we expand yields by this method, it will only work in the short term. Add to that the very real problem of expanding deserts, water scarcity and degraded soils, then that too will prevent the planet from expanding its food production to meet this growing population. Further, the way we are polluting the seas, as well as over fishing them, we will lose that resource as a means of feeding people too.

Now if you then add in the effects of global warming, an already mind numbing situation starts to look like a disaster. Even if we only add in the most conservative effects of Climate Change, drought from the loss of the mountain glaciers, coastal flooding causing salinity of the farming land around the worlds coasts, and hotter dryer summers combined with sudden flood events, the problem of water becomes obvious.

Already, there are problems with food shortages. The effects of Climate Change are reducing yields of important food crops already. Wheat, Corn and Rice. This is provoking food riots among the poor around the world. This is happening now, so how much worse will it be if we have a population of nine billion?

Quite simply we will face refugees fleeing famine.

This is why I can not see that level of population ever occurring. We are just to selfish and wasteful to provide an equitable distribution food around the world today, so how can we feed another three billion people?

Here is another fact that should shock people. Here in the UK every day eight million pounds worth of food is thrown out. Exclude the environmental cost of shipping in and then throwing out all that food, and you still have enough food discarded to feed all of the under nourished around the world.

The one key fact that I have learnt about providing good development is that education is vital. Further, educating women is the cornerstone of good development policy. As well as the simple fact that women in most of the world are the food growers and providers, but educating women empowers them to have greater control of their bodies. Put quite simply educated women have fewer children. Additionally, providing an education to women has been proven by the Non Government Agencies, charities providers of aid and education, is the most effective route out of poverty for most families. However, there is another factor in this equation that of religious and social taboos regarding sex. This became most apparent in the fight to stop the spread of AIDS/HIV.

Rather than enable the use of Condoms, religious leaders would advocate abstinence. While that may sound a reasonable way forward to many people, it actually ignores the reality of cultural differences and the way that women are still treated as property.

I have spoken before of my repugnance of the policy of people like Bush who will not fund any development project that enables the use of Condoms or provides education regarding family planning. However it is not just George W, there are almost all the religious leaders; Christian, Muslim etc., who are promoting this form of keeping women oppressed and keeping people in poverty

If we are to even start tackling this crisis of over population then we really need to start tackling poverty head on.

I don't see the future as a desperate one. We can make the future better for all, what is needed is the political will.

Global Food System Must Change

The State of the Union

Last night I stayed up to listen to George W Bushes State of the Union address. While it did not contain anything that was surprising, there were three aspects that I found frustrating. The first was the Bush stance on Climate Change. While there appears to be a recognition of the reality of climate change, under bush, there will not be any real or substantive action until countries like China and India start tackling climate change as well.

Well China is, while china is doing this in part as the PR for the Olympics, there is also a recognition that a changing climate is already causing problems. Desertification, Drought, Floods and its having an economic impact too. That is why China is building the largest solar power station in the world in the Gobi Desert.

The difference really is that the US has a Gross Domestic Product of fifteen trillion Dollars, while Chinas economy is still only two and a quarter of a trillion dollars. If China can do it I am sure that the US could, and in my opinion should, be doing much more.

The other aspect of the proper gander of this speech was when Bush talked about overseas aid. Because of religious interference, the US refuses to fund or support any project that promotes the use of condoms as a way of tackling HIV/AIDS. Even though the world health organisation and a myriad of other specialists know that the use of condoms is the only was that the spread of HIV/AIDS can be halted. This stance, by Bush, is based upon an ideology that's akin to the belief that the earth is flat. Don't get me started on natural selection!

Over the years of listening to the world service, reading books, and talking to people involved in development, the one aspect of development that has the greatest benefit is family planning. Empowering and educating women actually has the greatest positive effect on the health, economics and productivity of the developing world. Therefore, the US dictating that aid will only be given to peoples and projects that comply with the morality (the word that Bush used in the speech) of the religious right (wing), is not only wrong but adds to the problems that the developing world has. Further, it adds (Rightly or Wrongly) to the impression that America is pushing an anti Moslem agenda.

Lastly was the way that the US has dealt with current financial crisis. The US economy has some serious structural problems. Over recent years it has been on a spending spree, this has been funded by borrowing. Here in the UK we have done the same, so we are not guilt free here. While borrowing can really help people archive more sooner, borrowing has to be repaid. The problem is that this borrowing has come from overseas, predominantly China and South East Asia. That means that now Americans are busy working to boost the economic standing of China, Korea, Japan etc.

This was why in the 1970s in the UK we had to sort out the structural problems of our economy as during the Second World War we had borrowed so much from the US. It was only last year that we finally repaid that money. The US now has a similar problem, with government borrowings of three trillion dollars, that's twenty percent of the US economy, America has to work harder just to pay off the debt.

Further as US business has transported industries and jobs overseas, cutting the taxes of the richer citizens will do little to help this problem. Had Bush given the money to the poorest people in the US then you would have seen that money spent and injected into the US economy and not spent on servicing overseas debt.

I never expected much from Bush and I was not disappointed, given all the problems in the world it would have been great if the speech had not been full of idealogical rhetoric and had more substantive action.