Environmental Injustice & Food Insecurity By: Winston Carroo & Mikhiela Sherrod, Agricultural Missions, Inc. (AMI)
In term Environment Injustice has been generally understood to mean deliberately subjecting recent years, the economically disadvantaged and (racial) minority communities to harmful industrial wastes which are detrimental to personal and community health and well-being as well as causing long term damage to the physical environment. These actions include the dumping of toxic industrial and medial wastes, construction debris and even out- of-state household garbage. This is not limited to solid waste products but also air and water pollution by factories, oil refineries, chemical plants and automobiles. Immediate Environmental Injustice occurrences-manifested as poor health of those affected, polluted water and other environmental damage-often mask their impacts on climate change which results in more long term and seemingly less urgent consequences.
Food insecurity is one consequence of climate change which is not directly attributed to environmental injustice, but which certainly has played significant roles. Climate change, as manifested in changes in rainfall patterns and temperatures, has significant negative impact on food production in developing countries that lack mitigation technologies, such as irrigation. In countries such as the United States, technologies exist that can mitigate these impacts, in the short term, and allow food production to continue. food production capacity, climatic events such as hurricanes, are the drivers of natural disasters that result in food insecurity by destroying infrastructure and food supplies and isolating communities for extended periods of time. Not all disasters are the result of climate change. Wars, civil conflicts, and health emergencies such as the COVID-19 pandemic have the potential to do the same by disrupting supply chains on which communities depend for delivery of the essentials of life. In addition to reducing
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