What causes famine
- Crop failure or lost income
- Soaring prices
- Stocks follow paying buyers
- Roads, rights, and government decisions
The second point is key. It is not the person without food nearby who goes hungry, but the person who cannot pay for it. A farmhand who loses work because of a crop failure loses access to food before the food itself runs out.
This leads to an observation that may seem cynical at first. During many disasters, food continued to be exported from starving regions because buyers with money were outside the region, while no money was left inside.
What matters most
Famine researchers have long observed that mass famines hardly ever occur where there is a free press and accountable government. Not because there is more food there, but because people learn about the crisis before it becomes irreversible.
The mechanism is simple. Famine develops over weeks and months, and a timely warning makes it possible to bring in food or give people money. Where reporting the crisis is dangerous, the warning comes too late.
That is why modern aid increasingly takes the form of cash payments rather than food handouts. If food is available in the region, money works faster and does not undermine local trade, which otherwise cannot withstand competition from free food.
Small-seeming restrictions help too: limiting exports, controlling resellers, and supporting transport. These boring measures are what most often separate a difficult year from a catastrophe.
Finish reading in the Miqo app
1 more minute, then a quiz at the end. Find it under “Dark History → Famine”
Point your phone camera here to open the App Store or Google Play.
Sources
- Famine research describes it as a loss of access to food, not only a physical shortage: during several major disasters, food continued to be exported from affected areas. Researchers note a link between the absence of mass famines and the presence of a free press and accountable government