Word: harvests
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1970-1979
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...also discussed the question of food aid to India. Mrs. Gandhi refuses to acknowledge publicly that thousands of people have died of starvation in the states of Bihar and West Bengal (see SPECIAL SECTION). The Prime Minister, having proudly proclaimed her country's self-sufficiency after a record harvest in 1971, was reluctant to accept any aid that made India seem to be on the American dole again...
After World War II, however, it seemed that man at long last was winning the battle against hunger. Bumper harvests in many nations, notably the U.S., created food surpluses in the West, while the development of "miracle seeds" brought the hope that the densely populated poor countries would soon attain self-sufficiency. Then, in the past two years, this optimism turned to despair as hunger and famine began ravaging hundreds of millions of the poorest citizens in at least 40 nations. Much of the ground gained in the battle for food seemed lost as the world's harvest...
Even the U.S. is no longer the bottomless cornucopia that it once seemed. By October this year, miserable weather had reduced the harvest of corn by 16% and soybeans by 19%, while demands from the developing countries continue to mount. Merely to feed one pound of grain per person daily to their added population by 1985, they may have to import at least 85 million tons of grains, compared with 25 million tons now. Their import bill, figured at current prices, would top $17 billion for food alone; they would still have big requirements for imported technology, oil and manufactured...
...rich fields of India's Rejasthan state, where the monsoon rains usually sweep in faithfully each summer, the rice crop has been devastated by the first drought in years. Eastward on the Indian subcontinent, great floods have ruined the Bangladesh harvest. Far off in Africa's Sahel region, six years of drought have only recently been interrupted by rain. In the U.S., both the corn and soybean crops will fall far below expectations this year because of a freakish succession of excess spring rains, summer drought and early fall frost...
...highest paid farm laborers--the lettuce and grape workers under union contracts. The lettuce worker contracts provide for wages of $2.44-$2.49 per hour and piece rates of 42-45 cents per box. If (1) climate and crop conditions are excellent; (2) a worker follows the year-round lettuce harvest from Arizona up the California valleys; (3) the laborer cuts lettuce (the most back-breaking job in the harvest); (4) there is a minimum of dead time (when crops aren't ready or transportation is slow); (5) the laborer works a 6 day week, 50 weeks a year...