Stories and News

Stories and News No. 242 Today I read two news that I have to put together. The first concerns the research of the Italian Association of Dietetics and Clinical Nutrition ( ADI ). They announced that actually in Italy there are 4 million and 700,000 obese people, a significant increasing number, particularly among men and especially children. To further sensitize the public, the association has organized a national event on Oct. 10 and 11 with an unmistakable name: Obesity Day 2010 . At the same time, I learn from various newspapers that, in view of the World Food Day on October 16 ( United Against Hunger ), Medecins sans frontieres (Doctors without borders) are launching a campaign entitled: Food is not enough . The famous humanitarian organization presents a very touching work in support of it: Starved for attention . Now, without considering the merits of the obesity problem, its causes and origins, aware that being overweight is also due to some disease, it is inevitable ...

Despite of today complaint of internet censorship , before flying to China, Obama made a statement that has worried many powerful men in the old continent: the United States does not want to stem the rapid Chinese development because a strong and prosperous China is good for everyone . Come on, let us be disillusioned. Although today the FAO World Food Summit on food security has opened in Rome, where we will see a parade of leaders from around the world, spread out enlightened discourse, full of words like solidarity, understanding and heartfelt respect to the billions of hungry people on the earth, we perfectly know what our politicians’ priorities are. Moreover, in Italy we have today a government that is always first to show what problems are primary in their thoughts. Yesterday, Foreign Affairs Minister Franco Frattini has released an interview with the Times stating that the European Union must absolutely respond to the nascent United States China axis. How? It is simp...

Original post Today is the World Food Day , an event established by FAO to raise awareness of the issues behind poverty and hunger. The 14th of October the UN organization presented the 2009 Report on the hunger situation in the world. It tells that more than one billion people , one sixth of world population , lives in a condition of intolerable undernourishment : I could write an easy post denouncing the shame of our political leaders, because no one has found time to pay public attention to the news… However, I prefer to propose you a simple consideration, just comparing the numbers of two categories which, admittedly, are poles apart in the scale of priorities of our world: human beings and money . On the one hand, one billion people , more than 600 million in Asia and the Pacific, 265 million in Sub-Saharan Africa, 53 million in Latin America and the Caribbean, 42 in the Near East and North Africa and 15 in developed countries suffer from hunger . On the other ...