Recently there's been a rise in salmon prices
due to the outbreak of sea lice. The Guardian reports that there was a 50% rise
in whole sale cost. Over the past year the global supply of salmon decreased by
9% will likely continue to fall. Experts attribute the recent increase in
parasites to rising sea temperatures due to climate change.
In
class we discussed what qualifies as a disaster. The rise in salmon prices is
not a disaster, more of a concern than anything. However, the rise of parasites
due to climate change is a worrying development. Climate change obviously
qualifies as a disaster, since it results in a variety of disasters: extreme
weather, water shortages, rising sea levels, rising sea temperatures, food
shortages, thinning of the ozone layer, melting ice caps, etc. Although
this specific instance may not qualify as a disaster, food shortages (as well
as water shortages) are becoming more and more common due to climate change. The
constant increase in population will also lead to more cases of food
insecurity.
The question then becomes: when is food security
a disaster? Are famines disasters? When will it become a worldwide issue
instead of one that disproportionately affects underdeveloped and developing
countries? Will developed countries begin focusing on finding solutions for food
and water scarcity soon or only when it affects them or their interests? Even
the media hasn’t been reporting much on the famine in Yemen. In the U.S. we are
used to having an abundance of food in our supermarkets, obesity is a larger
concern than starvation. This makes it difficult for us to actually pay
attention and see how recent events such as sea lice indicate a larger issue of
food insecurity.
The topic you've brought up in your final paragraph is similar to what we were discussing in class in regards to not only what gets classified as a disaster but who it is that decides this!
ReplyDeleteThe questions you brought up are some of the same questions that I have spent time thinking about as well! Maybe famines can be classified as products of disasters, since may times they occur in regions of the world where land is not fertile or suffering from drought and desertification. But this also makes me think- where do the roles of humans fit in, and are all disasters human-induced? What disasters occurred before neanderthals roamed the earth, and was climate change inevitable?
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