The amazing lecture about Second Food Harvest

It was really amazing lecture for me! Charles McJilton taught me a lot what I didn’t know until I listened to his lecture.

 

First, there are 19.5 million people who are suffering from poverty in Japan, however, most of them are not homeless or beggar. Those who receive food from 2HJ (Second Food Harvest) are like fatherless families, the elderly citizens, the poor foreigners and so on.

 

Unfortunately, the number of the people who need 2FJ’s help are increasing day by day.

 

His lecture made me think what to do to curb the situation.

One of the answers is to do my absolute best what I can soon. After listening to his lecture, I felt more that I want to participate in their activities as soon as possible.

By reading the book "Food for All"

I have been reading the book, “Food for All”, it can teach me what the agriculture should be in the future. By the before, people have depended too much on chemical fertilizer or pesticide and so on.

 

 As a result, they could temporarily get material wealth, but instead of that, that they lost a lot of things. At the same time, it occurred some serious problems.

 

During the World War ⅠandⅡ, the countries of colonialism had made the famers in their colonies cultivate only one kind of product to gain their immediate profit only.

It can stated that the trigger for the issue of hunger was their behaves.

 So now, these countries are suffering from the lack of output and trying to change to inter agriculture from mono agriculture. But, considerable cash will be needed to do it.

 

Also, the value of organic farming is being reappreciated all over the world. However, it can also be expected to cost a large amount of money, unfortunately…

 

To curb the situation, the developed countries, especially the former colonial rulers, should provide the developing countries the expenses necessary for renovation of their agricultural method. They must help these countries because they have responsibilities to solve their serious problems.

"PLANEAT"

I tried to find the film “Planet Eat”, but I could not find it, so I watched “Planeat” because I thought that these titles are similar, so I tried to watch the movie trailer.

 

It seems that this film asks to us “what we should choose to keep our health.” Recently, the number of cancer or heart disease patients is increasing. According to this film, one of the reasons is that people haven't been eating properly lately.

 

This movie is cast with a famous chef who is particular about organic foods or vegetable dish and the three notable scientists. They lay their lives on the line to find the answer of the question.

 

Watching this movie, we will think about this difficult question with them and it will lead to indicate the way to go.

 

I'm interested in the rest of the film, so I would like to watch it soon!

Charles McJilton

I didn’t know that 6000 tons of food is discarded every day in Tokyo until I read this article. Charles McJilton, a NGO staff, has been working to reduce the amount food waste and provide food product to some places. Second Harvest Japan has also provided food to disaster areas in Tohoku since March 11 2011.

According to CNN, Japan has very high standard to demand, so even if a product has a little damage, it cannot be sold.

There are many people around the globe who don't have enough to eat. On the other hand, the Japanese people tend to leave large amount of food. We should remember that and encourage to reduce the amount of food waste.

 I thought that these ways are waste. I thought I’m lucky because I want to join the activities of Second Harvest Japan, so I’m really looking forward to listen to his lecture.

My impressions of the Steve Gardner lecture and concert

He sang with only one his installment, but the performance was very amazing and exciting for me! I enjoyed that time because he not only played instrument but also worked in some jokes while singing.

Probably, all of us roared at his funny jokes.

 

And, in his lecture, he told us about the story of Coca-Cola. 3 weeks ago, I had a presentation of the poetry, “Coca Cola and Coco Frio.” I realized how dangerous it is for our body, but after his lecture, I felt that more strongly.

And, he told that the food had strong taste to preserve when he was a child. I thought that point is related to obesity among the American.

“Poverty is the chief reason why people go hungry.”

In the rural areas in developing countries, there are few jobs and few chances to earn money, so people in these areas can’t buy food. This is the cycle of poverty.

 

The last summit was held in 1996, and it was estimated to be about 840 million people who were chronically hungry. The leaders of the summit are planning to spend US $60 billion to reduce the incidence of hungry.

 

Clean water and fresh food are concentrated on the wealthy countries, so the poor countries can’t get adequate food and water.

 

It is more serious problem than I thought. There is a big difference between the rich countries and the poor countries and it is not easy to reduce the huge difference, I thought…

 

The Problem of Food Waste

The Chinese citizens have tackled a serious problem about food waste. The campaign that recommended kids to eat without leaving anything was held.

According to China Daily, the food waste accounts for about 70% of the country’s garbage.

 

 750 restaurants have started the campaigns to decrease the amount of food waste. For example, they serve smaller dishes than usual or provide doggy bags to cut down the leftover food. People in China have discussed about “clean your plate” campaign by using SNS.

 

With the growth of China’s national strength, the Chinese people tend to spend extravagantly for something. This will bring a bad influence to not only their own country but also other countries.

To solve the problem of food waste, we should start from what we can do easily.

 

 

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In the chapter 3....

Staple foods are mostly produced by the farmers in developing countries such as Asian and African countries. Wheat, rice, maize, cocoa, coffee, potato, sugar and so on. Have you ever thought “who grows what?” the farmers in these countries are forced to concentrate on few varieties of crops, but it led to a serious result. They could get few benefit from monocropping because the term they could cultivate crops was limited, it led to slack in product quality control. The author emphasized the importance of switching to intercropping(mixed cropping) in developing countries in this chapter.

 

After reading the chapter of the book I chose

“Monocropping dominates the Western-style.” The Western countries cultivated crops such as maize, millet, wheat. These products were cultivated a few thousand years ago. However, the intensive system of Western agriculture had often faced difficult problems. However, it could survive the first time because the government gave the farmers large amount of subsidy. Secondly, more serious problem had occurred. It is the problem of Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy(BSE)－that is “mad cow disease.” On the contrary, it brought the big change for the Western agriculture. The farmers decided to switch to organic agriculture. It was quickly spread all over the world. In any case, it would be hard that the intensive system of Western agriculture can survive in the future because it has many risks.

 

I did not know how long ago the agriculture was existed until I read this chapter of the book. I thought mono-agriculture is not good for the country because it will have so many risks to survive and will not be able to survive so long. So, whole countries should never adopt it.

after reading the introduction of the book "Food for All: The Need for a New Agriculture"

John Madeley who is an author of this book has newly suggested how to deal with agriculture. With rapidly developing the technology, the farming system has been changed. For example, farmers have tended to produce on a large scale because they are particular about amount sold. On the other hand, they have neglected their duties to keep safety and quality of products because of using a large amount of agricultural chemicals. This is the one of the latest issues about agriculture. After I had read the introduction of the book, the issues about agriculture has been more serious than I thought, so I will think carefully about them while reading this book.

One of my favorite Italian dish!

One of most popular Italian dishes is Meat Sauce, but it is a little high calories because it is used ground beef. The speaker introduced “Vegetarian Meat Sauce” that is Vegetarian version .  She didn’t use ground beef. As a ground beef substitute, she used “Vegetarian Meat Crumble.” According to her, They are low fat, high flavor, and it cooks really fast, so that will be exactly two birds with one stone.  This is so healthy, so anyone including people who mind the calories can eat it. Probably, they will not notice that it is not used ground beef because they feel like real meat and tasty until they know that. If I have a chance, I would like to cook it.

I will post the podcast’link which I watched.

https://itunes.apple.com/jp/podcast/delicious-tv/id257573196?mt=2

4th Annual “Gohan (Food) Film Festival”

This event looks very interesting! If we go there, we will be able to watch the remarkable movies with enjoying a special meal. I will be able to have the time of my life.

 Especially, I checked the movie trailer of "Bagdad Café", it looks very exciting. I would like to take notice of a lonely German woman who had quarreled with her husband in this movie. Also, I also looked through the summary of "Coffee & Cigarettes," I really want to know the rest of what happens in this movie. In the case of me, both of their images are not so good, because they are not healthy for our body. So, I’m interested in the story. Anyway, I would love to go and see the movies.

Tokyo Vegefood Festa in 2013

I read the official website of TOKYO Vegefood Festa. It seems to be interesting! I remembered another festival which was annual event and held in Yoyogi Park in May. When  I have been to Earth Day Tokyo as a volunteer, we enjoyed eating healthy food ( I feel that the food which I ate was like Vegan food…).  It was the first time that I got to know Vegan food is delicious and has many good points. And, it will a good chance to taste Vegan food which I haven’t eaten yet. Unfortunately, I will not be able to go to the festival because I have plans. So, if anybody will go there, please tell me about your impressions.

Food Aphorisms

"A fit, healthy body-that is the best fashion statement"
I agree with this poem. People long to be beautiful, so some of them tend to spend a lot of money on nice dresses, expensive jewelry and so on. But this poem says that we should do moderate exercise, eat a balanced diet and sleep well. This is the best way to keep a healthy body if we want to be beautiful. It seems to be simple, but it's the most important for us, I think.

"We must have a pie. Stress cannot exist in the presence of a pie."
Of course, I can understand a little, but that's going too far. Even if I have a pie to eat, sometimes I stress out. When we want to work off, we tend to drink and eat too much to try to reset, but it is not good for our body. To keep a healthy body mentally and physically, we need to do moderate exercise, sleep well and have a balanced diet. Balance is important.

Picnic!

It was very fun for me to go on a picnic because I feel we could become friendlier each other than before we did. The end of the first class, I was troubled because I was worried about the future. However, we shore manmade dishes, talked with almost all of classmates.
Unfortunately, last Friday was not good weather, so we could not enjoy the picnic properly. Instead of that, we could enjoy other things. For example, Nori-Maki Karen made and minced meat rolled in cabbage leaves Hitomi made were so good. Moreover, some of you tried to juggle some balls and pins with Mr. Dias. It looked interesting, I should also have challenged, too...
By the way, everyone were supposed to introduce any physical activities, but we could n't due to a bad weather. If it was a good day, what activity were you going to introduce? In my case, I was supposed to introduce "Drop the Handkerchief Game." Do you know or have you ever done it when you were children? I used to do it many times with my friends when I was a child, so this is familiar to me.
Finally, as I have stated before, last class was so exciting for me. Taking this opportunity, I would like to get along with all of you. And, if we can get a good chance, I want to do all the things we couldn't do last week while I can in a sunny day.