25,000 people around the world die from hunger each day.

If one looks at the money that is doled out to NGOs there ought not be a single being that is hungry, a single being that is not clothed or housed but the truth is otherwise. This money is siphoned out and that is the bitter truth. Direct charity is the only way one can eradicate poverty from the face of the earth. You must have heard also of the Chinese saying "Give not fish but the fishing tackle". It suits the so called NGOs to want to give fish and not the fishing tackle as this is the way they can fill their own coffers. I am not paranoid GG but it is a simple mathematical calculation.

The frauds that I have heard about are usually perpetrated by the "Official" government distribution centers, so I guess I get paranoid in the other direction. Much of what is donated to charities IS eaten up by administrative costs or charges,and that Is a problem. We have a very similar saying to the one from China: "Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day, teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime." It may have originated with the one from China. Any organization that we give our hard earned money to we need to investigate thoroughly. I am bombarded by many, and give or participate in very few.

Normally I never give money to NGOs but this NGO that deals with the welfare of animals was referred to me by my Vet and because of his high recommendations I succumbed but told them that I would want to know how they intend spending that money. Till today they have not got back to me. I have committed a crime against my own principles! Grrrrrrrrr.

I do agree to that sense in part to we all have duties it is more my personal vendetta against organizations that claim themselves but behind the scenes mean different. To the church part I know you didn't say that it is more my own rant sorry I do that sometimes lol, but I am glad at the work you do and I wasn't trying to offend just have personal views and concerns about some people I am more glad to know personal background it helps to believe in legitimacy.

Point taken. There are, I agree, organizations that spend a lot of money on promoting themselves instead of getting the job done. I do not post links or information about any of them that I doubt. Nor do I donate to them.I am a Christian, but the slant here is that anyone can be hungry and anyone can help.

Every time we help our friends and neighbors it is very valuable. I like to let people know of ways that they can give. Yes, it is important to help friends and family. Believe it or not, there are people who will not even do that.

This is a bit of a tangent, but I think kids are more open to foraging than grown ups. As a child I did a lot of experimental grazing so to speak.Luckily I never experimented with anything toxic. This also explains why, when I plant trees on my property, they are functional trees. That is they give shade, but they also give fruit, and I have fed many a bird, squirrel, possum and raccoon with the trees I have. We may all be coming to where we either need to grow food or forage for it. In a lot of countries there is a lack of water and therefore a lack of things growing to forage from. I also participate in programs that dig wells in needful countries.

Children are a lot more open to trying different things. As long as you can get to them early enough before they get conditioned by society about what is food and what is not. Recently while on a boat tour at a tropical fruit property, someone asked the tour conductor if the weed growing along the river bank was edible. He replied with a puzzled "no, it is a weed". He then had to be educated about many "weeds" being edible as he is clearly someone who is no used to looking outside the box for food! Good on you for having shade trees that can feed you. I have a couple of large mango trees here in my yard as shade trees. The fruit bats get a lot of it, but when it is a good year, we also get tons of fruit! No longer though as we have sold our house. As for the water shortages in many countries. There are many permaculturists doing aid work in a lot of these countries to get them going with low maintainance gardens that harvest all the water and stop run off. By slowing down the water run off, it sinks into the ground and eventually you end up with fertile soil where there was once desert.

You are exactly right. Sometimes we fail to count our blessings about what we do have.

Definitely, we have to cherish what ever we have!

Some stores are good to freeze things like meat and send them to food banks or provide other things that they can no longer legally sell. Some of that comes down to being afraid of lawsuits. When our WalMart became a Super Wal Mart, I went in one day to buy some bananas. They were perfect. Just the way I like them, yellow. And the employee was putting them on a cart. She said, I cannot sell these to you they are too ripe. I do not want anyone to get sick from eating a banana. It is good to realize the difference between being hungry and being starving. Each one of the sites I mentioned is different in its focus. Numana is actually for people who are so malnourished they cannot eat many foods. It is designed to be nourishing and healing to restore strength as quickly as possible. We probably do have people who are at that point here in the US as well. I have not seen them. We have one homeless person in our town that I am aware of, and she is homeless by choice, yet even she is not starving, but has money to walk into the grocery deli and buy some cooked chicken. It makes me so mad when I let food go to waste and spoil without eating it. If I am tired of it, I can freeze it, or share a meal with someone else.

Welcome to MyLot dubagee

That is why I posted about Numana. They certainly can use our time as volunteers even if we do not have much money.

Even if we cannot do everything for people, we can do a little bit. All those little bits add up. I hope you are doing better. I think I had better look and see which discussions of yours I might have missed.

Yes, that is true. Some causes of hunger can be weather related though, and a society that normally could grow their own food and raise their own livestock will be decimated by flood or drought. Just providing a meal or two is not the answer, I know, but it does solve and immediate need while people work on a long term solution.

That is why those who understand the problems need to support sustainable agriculture in places rather than the "slash and burn" technique.

I completely agree, but sometimes floods and droughts are man made. Clear felling slopes can lead to floods for instance, and soil erosion makes the effects of drought catastrophic.

We do what we can where we can. I used to start a similar discussion about every three months. I have not in a long while.I see someone wants to turn this into a discussion about politics and religion, and that is his privilege, I guess. I have been hungry, but not to the point of starvation. I like to be able to give, whether it is here in the US or in another country. We all get equally hungry when we miss meals.

I used to start discussions about some of these sites on a regular basis.I also periodically post about donating blood. Numanainc is new to me as of today.They have great credentials and a good distribution plan in association with Salvation Army. None of us has much to spare any more.

That is one reason why I post about good organizations like this. I also see us freely exchanging ideas about how to address the issue. One new poster states that he knows when he wants to eat he is not "starving" and never phrases it that way. I suspect that there are people who use MyLot to help supplement their grocery money. Or they use other online earnings as well. That is one good reason to treat each other kindly as we interact here on the Lot.

With as many people as we have on various discussion sites and social sites we should be able to do good. I do not mean to come across as proud, but more concerned. I will also admit that I know there are people that rely on the little money they earn here and other places online to pay for their food or their internet, and I think it is good to remember that.