Starting the New Course

I'm really impressed with FutureLearn, it's actually a lot better than I thought it would be. There are a lot of discussions and debates on the course forum and so many different interesting ideas, as people from all over the world are both tutoring and learning on this course you get a really diverse range of ideas. The very first thing on the course is a really hard 'no real answer' question which has been left up for debate.

'Whose responsibility is it to ensure that everyone in the world has access to enough nutritious food?'

The majority of people seem to be saying either the government or us. I don't think it's that simple, there are so many layers to this. Morally I think we all have a responsibility to make sure people are fed, it is a basic human right. Practically there isn't much an individual can do. In a ideal world cities and communities would look after each other and make sure their neighbours are fed, with city councils making sure there is enough for all with each town/city being self sustaining, but the world is anything but ideal.

There is enough food grown and produced in the world to feed everyone, yet there are still people who go hungry, why? Where has it all gone wrong?  I sure do not have the answer, and I'm not well up on the subject to even give a definitive answer, but I'm pretty certain greed and capitalism has something to do with it. I get that farmers do have to make a living, they sell to the supermarkets, the supermarkets sell as high as they can to us, we are slaves to the best before dates and perfect produce - what happens to the wonky veg? Most of the time they are discarded although perfectly fine. But there is no way the supermarkets will give this food away, and if they did, who could or would decide who gets the 'free food'? And then how would we get the food to the people who need it, remember we are talking globally here.

I don't think any one organization could or should be in control of feeding the world, if it was that perfect ideal world it would work, but the world is corrupt, politics would come in to play, and where would the line be drawn, or how would hunger be measured? Who decides what counts as nutritious?
I do not know the answer, but I think there are things we can do to help, food banks are a start but they're not enough, volunteer groups like Food Not Bombs are an amazing source of food for the homeless and the poor, but they do not have the means to provide food daily. I believe that we should start with education, teaching children (and in many cases adults too) where their food comes from, how and where it is grown and how to grow it for themselves along with how precious it is would be a good place to start for a long term plan.

I could write my uninformed opinion for hours and hours on this subject, so for the time being I will leave it here. I am interested to see if or how my opinion will change as the course progresses.