Exponential increases in food prices in recent times have created enormous challenges to governments, national and international organizations, and aid agencies everywhere in the world. The World Bank has estimated that the rising food prices could push an additional 100 million people into poverty, thereby undermining the current efforts geared towards poverty reduction.

Increasing demand, decreasing supply, and the rising oil prices, which are in turn affected by numerous other factors, have been some reasons for the rise in food prices. Demand for cereal grains has been rising not only as a result of population growth, but also because of the growing middle class population in countries like China and India. Growing incomes have resulted in more demand for cereal grains directly and also more meat and dairy, which in turn has raised the demand for more grains as feed for the livestock. Another more important reason for the rise in demand for food crops is the development of bio-fuels, which have attracted a great deal of attention in recent times.

On the supply front, according to a publication by the International Center for Trade and Sustainable Development (ICTSD), droughts in Australia and Turkey and bad weather in Ukraine and parts of North America have resulted in less agricultural production which has caused food prices to rise. A more important, but often overlooked reason for the decrease in the supply of farm commodities against rising demand is that the subsidies that the developed countries have been providing to their agriculture sector have dampened world prices of those products and made the products of developing countries uncompetitive. This has had a tremendous impact in agricultural production in developing countries. In the absence of competitiveness and any other gains to be derived from agriculture, the developing countries have had less incentive to invest in agricultural infrastructure, agricultural research and development, and the like. As a result, agriculture production in these countries continually declined disrupting supply.

Then, who should take the blame of rising food prices? If we look at the demand side, we see that the demand has been rising in one part because of rising incomes in few developing countries, and on the other, because of the development of bio-fuels by the developed countries. On the supply side, drought and bad weather conditions are not something which are under human control, but less supply resulting from less production in developing countries owing to the agricultural policies of the developed countries definitely deserves attention.

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IYSoCC Delegates with Mr. Narayana Murthy (Founder, CEO Infosys)

Hosted by Infosys - the biggest IT brand in India and a big IT brand in the world, and organized by the Indian Youth Climate Network (IYCN), the first Indian Youth Summit on Climate Change (IYSoCC) concluded successfully in the cyber-city of Hyderabad last week. The Summit brought together youth delegates from all across the country and also the Non-Resident Indians (NRIs) from across the globe, to discuss, debate, point out regional, national and global problems aiming to come up with workable solutions. Policy level interventions, a youth declaration for a safer and more secure tomorrow and an even greater youth representation was called for in the four day summit.

The summit also saw participation from some key organizations viz., Environmental Defense, Sierra Club, The Climate Project, Greenpeace etc. most of whom have now been showing keen interest in the green developments in India and believe that India can lead, by example, the movement towards a cleaner, greener and more secure tomorrow.

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In Robin Shreeve’s provocative article, “Whose Responsibility is Sustainable Consumerism?”, she champions the youngest generation’s recognition that the responsibility for our actions lies with us individually, not mainly with corporations.  Three months ago, I would have toasted to her conclusion.  (Of course, I then believed we don’t need corporations whatsoever and we could live without them and be sustainable.)  Today, however, my reaction to Robin’s article is different.  I’m inclined to deeply disagree.

During the sustainable living experiment called the Sust Enable Film Project (which concludes by midnight today), I would argue that I succeeded in living sustainably less than a dozen days of the 3-month project.  Does this fact disappoint me?  At first, it did.  But I will tell you why my experiment failed.

There are systems in the United States–for getting food, for getting rid of our trash, for flushing away our body wastes–that collectively (and historically), we have all agreed to adopt and abide by.  They seem(ed) like the best solutions for problems we all face, and as a society (through the government) wereinforce these systems.  This was clear to me every time I flushed a public toilet, and another huge chunk was subtracted from my sustainable water use for the day.  This became even clearer when I learned that many sustainable living methods–such as dumpster diving, squatting, and building a composting toilet–are outright illegal in many towns.

Doing something illegal (like dumpster diving) if it seems right to you… that’s one thing.  Civil disobedience: often harmless, functional, and a true expression of freedom.  There’s nothing wrong with that.  But going hungry because the society-subverting alternatives are more difficult, demanding or have greater consequences than the unsustainable, mainstream options?

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The streets are going to be reoriented at an angle to maximize solar and minimize wind. It will include 6,000 units of high-density housing, without any single detached residences. Thirty percent of the housing will be affordable.

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It’s important for green businesses to be exactly that: green. This means you go the extra mile to examine the environmental consequences of every aspect of your business. That’s a lot of responsibility, so it requires careful consideration every step of the business planning process. Before you even open your doors for business, you should have a plan in place for running your business as sustainably as possible. Green businesses may even want to include a sustainable development section in their business plans.

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