Look at these innocent faces !

That's certainly a worthy goal. Have you ever heard of the dairy mountains? Basically, in many European countries, food such as butter, milk, chocolate and cheese is stockpiled in a joint venture between government and private enterprise as a safeguard against inflation and poverty in the country. Every few months, great shiploads of these stockpiled foodstuffs (and I mean tankers, people!) are sunk in the middle of the ocean somewhere, as the food goes bad after a prolonged period of time. Instead of bothering to pay a little extra to transport the food to people starving, which they could easily do, these countries simply dump the food so keep inflation down - if the excess flooded the market, it could result in a depression, as farmers and producers would not be able to keep selling at competitive prices and keeping the economy stable. While I understand and applaud the need to ensure economic stability, what I don't get is why these governments (and others like them throughout the world - brazil's coffee, australia and america's meat, wheat and vegetables, etc,.) don't simply arrange for agencies to collect money to pay for the fuel if it's not viable and distribute it at no cost to poorer nations, gradually reducing shipments until those countries have regained economic viability. I understand that selling the food is not profitable - but neither is sinking it! We could easily feed most of the third world if we wanted - it would seem to me that our we, just as much as our governments, are too complacent and mercenary to bother. The mere fact that there is so little publicity about this issue in particular makes us implicit in the deaths of millions, doesn't it?