Pope Francis is demanding dignity, not charity, for the world’s poor and hungry. His comments came on Friday at a UN conference on nutrition hosted by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation. The Pontiff condemned speculation in food commodities and greed, saying they undermined the global fight against poverty and hunger. “It is also painful to Read more
Odd diets and limited funds are not unknown to university students, but some are making the best of it to help do some good. From October 6, dozens of Victoria University students will spend five days living off whatever meals they can make for $2.25 a day. They have have signed up to take part Read more
It may not make his family wealthy, but Devran Mankar is still grateful for the pearl millet variety called Dhanshakti (meaning “prosperity and strength”) he has recently begun growing in his small field in the state of Maharashtra, in western India. “Since eating this pearl millet, the children are rarely ill,” raves Mankar, a slim man Read more
An appeals court in Hanoi, Vietnam, has upheld the sentence of a jailed Catholic lawyer, who is on a hunger strike to get access to Communion and Confession. The People’s Supreme Court upheld the jail term of 30 months for lawyer and dissident Joseph Le Quoc Quan for charges of tax evasion. His firm was Read more
“The kumara does not tell of how sweet it is” says an old Maori proverb. For Funaki Vehekite, 53, the sweet potato is all the sweeter because it allows him to support his family and keep his five children in school. At his farm in Tongatapu, Tonga’s largest island, he also produces food crops such as kape, Read more
On Dec. 10th, 2013, Pope Francis is inviting the world to join him in a global wave of prayer to end world hunger. New Zealanders will be among the first to have the chance to catch the wave. The Pope’s message will be available from 9am New Zealand time. In the video Pope Francis invites all people – organisations and Read more
On Dec. 10th, 2013, Pope Francis is inviting the world to join him in a global wave of prayer to end world hunger. The global wave of prayer will begin at noon in Tonga, progressing around the world until reaching American Samoa 24 hours and 164 countries later. Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga, president of Vatican-based Read more
Pope Francis has condemned the waste of food as a symptom of a “throwaway culture” and said hunger and malnutrition should never be considered “an inescapable fact of life”. He called for greater efforts to build a worldwide “culture of encounter and solidarity”. The Pope’s words came in his annual message for World Food Day, Read more
There is no better way to channel the mind-bending logic of 18th century thinkers on poverty (men who we can assume were not poor themselves, by virtue of the fact that history remembers them) than to simply quote their words. Meet Philippe Hecquet, a well-known French doctor speaking in 1740: The poor … are like Read more
Catholic bishops’ conferences in the G8 nations have urged G8 leaders “to take steps to improve nutrition, reduce hunger and poverty, and strengthen just tax, trade and transparency policies for the common good of all”. “In a world that has made great strides in improving food production and distribution, far too many of God’s children Read more