by Atherton Martin

About the author: Atherton Martin, an official of the Development Institute, works with grassroots groups in the Caribbean. The following is taken from his keynote address to a 1993 World Bank Conference, entitled “Overcoming Global Hunger.”

In the last 500 years, there have been four major threats to the survival of humanity—(1) slavery, (2) fascism, (3) hunger and (4) environmental degradation. One of these has been overcome—slavery! To a greater or lesser extent, fascism, hunger and environmental degradation persist. Slavery was overcome by the action of people in the South and the North who were outraged by the very thought of one human being owning another human being!

The other threats to our humanity . . . await the action of people who are similarly outraged at the thought [of] the pain and indignity of hunger...