Food and environment

Abstract

There is a tendency for many of us who eat three square meals a day to forget how important food is. I want to argue that food is the most basic need for all communities. It has physical as well as psychological implications for individuals and the larger society. Food is required to produce dietary energy and is usually measured by hunger and mal- nutrition statistics but these statistics understate the importance of food and its direct link with mental and psychological state. For example, all the major health indicators are linked in one way or another with food - infant mortality, toddler mortality, life expectancy and so on. Now leave aside the statistics, look around us. Labourers often become sick and cannot work because of the lack of proper food. Their food-related illnesses further deprives their families of much- needed income, tightening the vicious circle of poverty more shortly around all family members, and bringing more unhappiness, misery and suffering. Children who do not have enough food do not do well in school, to learn and participate like other kids. Some of these children have been on a diet of semi-starvation when in their mother's womb, a handicap in life which they are never able to overcome.