Eight-Course Meal for G8: The End of Hunger (For Them)

Yesterday, as G8 members reached across the table to grab a helping of kelp-flavoured cold Kyoto beef shabu-shabu, an African child scraped around in the dirt for anything he could come across. As Gordon Brown tucked into an 18 dish meal (over eight courses, not including a five-course working lunch), the people of Britain baulked at the headlines that called for us to stop wasting food to avert a global food crisis. Forgive me if I sound blunt, but what a load of hypocrisy.

The world’s G8 leaders met in sunny Hokkaido, Japan, for a £285 million summit to discuss the global poverty problem. They dined on just about every animal under the sun, including kegani crab, smoked salmon and sea urchin pain-surprise-style, Kyoto beef and ‘milk-fed lamb’ (full menu at Times Online, it’s a real treat). Our letter to Brown not that long ago calling for him to adopt a vegetarian diet if he really cares about the food crisis had obviously slipped his mind.

A leaked World Bank report has concluded that biofuels have forced global food prices up by 75 percent, which in turn has pushed 100 million people across the world below the poverty line. So let me just remind you of a rather startling figure we gave our dear Prime Minister in April:

100 million tonnes of grain will be used to produce biofuel worldwide this year, 760 million tonnes will be used to feed chickens, pigs and other farmed animals.

Yet just a few hours before sinking his teeth (and the other G8 leaders’ of course, let’s not forget them) into dish after dish of extravagant – and most definitely not vegetarian – fayre, the government released this little gem:

“The rise of popular interest in food policy issues, and growing public awareness of the impact of what we choose to eat on everything from animal welfare, to our health and the protection of the environment has seen a massive transformation in Britain’s food culture over the past ten years.”

Elsewhere he also said:

“We need a global plan to deal with rising food prices that are affecting millions of families in Britain. That’s why I am proposing that we take action to both increase the global supply of food and reduce unnecessary demand.”

So, an 18 dish dinner is necessary, hmm?