By Jim Devine on www.hu-online.org
By the end of October this year, the UN estimates there will be seven billion people on the planet.
The International Federation of Red Cross/Red Crescent Societies says one billion are famished and another billion obese.
Unsurprisingly, most of the obese are in the developed world; most of the underfed are not.
The 2011 Index of Global Philanthropy and Remittances, produced by the Hudson Institute's Center for Global Prosperity, says private capital investment ($228b) remains the largest single financial flow from developed to developing nations. Remittances ($174b) are the second largest, followed by overseas development aid ($120b) and global philanthropy ($53b).
You'd think half a trillion dollars a year would be enough to sustain a billion. Apparently not.
The IFRC says the increasing frequency of disasters due to population explosion, climate change or both, is inflicting ever greater damage, loss and dislocation on vulnerable communities worldwide.
At the same time food prices are rising to the point where, according to Oxfam, the global food supply chain is "bust".
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