Famine

A famine is a phenomenon in which a large percentage of the population of a region or country are undernourished that death by starvation becomes increasingly common.

Historical famine, by region

Famine in Africa

In the mid 22nd century BCE, a sudden and short-lived climactic change that caused reduced rainfall resulted in several decades of drought in Upper Egypt. The resulting famine and civil strife is believed to have been a major cause of the collapse of the Old Kingdom.

Related Topics:
Upper Egypt - Old Kingdom

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An account from the First Intermediate Period states, "All of Upper Egypt was dying of hunger and people were eating their children." (http://www.touregypt.net/autobiographyofankhtifi.htm)

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Famine has been widespread in Africa in the modern era as well. Many African countries are not self-sufficent in food production, relying on income from cash crops to import food. Agriculture in Africa is susceptible to climatic fluctuations, especially droughts which can reduce the amount of food produced locally. Other agricultural problems include soil infertility, land degradation and erosion, and swarms of desert locusts which can destroy whole crops and livestock diseases.

Related Topics:
Africa - Cash crop - Agriculture - Climatic - Drought - Soil infertility - Land degradation - Erosion - Desert locust

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Other factors make the food security situation in Africa tenuous, including political instability, armed conflict and civil war, corruption and mismanagement of food supplies, and trade policies that harm African agriculture. AIDS is also having long-term economic effects on agriculture by reducing the available workforce.

Related Topics:
Food security - Civil war - Corruption - AIDS

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Recent examples include Ethiopia in 1973, Sudan in the late 1970s and Niger in 2005.

Related Topics:
Ethiopia - 1973 - Sudan - 1970s - Niger

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Famine in Asia

China

In China, the Great Leap Forward of Mao Zedong was a large scale social experiment. This resulted in a massive famine, generally considered to be caused by government economic policy.

Related Topics:
China - Great Leap Forward - Mao Zedong - Massive famine

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India

There were 14 famines in India between 11th and 17th century (Bhatia, 1985). B.M. Bhatia believes that the earlier famines were localised and it was only after 1860, during the British rule, that famine came to signify general shortage of foodgrains in the country. There were approximately 25 major famines spread through states such as Tamil Nadu in South India, Bihar in the north, and Bengal in the east in the latter half of the 19th century, killing between 30-40 million Indians. The famines were a product both of uneven rainfall and British economic and administrative policies, which since 1857 had led to the seizure and conversion of local farmland to foreign-owned plantations, restrictions on internal trade, heavy taxation of Indian citizens to support unsuccessful British expeditions in Afghanistan (see Second Anglo-Afghan War), inflationary measures that increased the price of food, and substantial exports of staple crops from India to Britain. Some British citizens such as William Digby agitated for policy reforms and famine relief, but Lord Lytton, the governing British viceroy in India, opposed such changes in the belief that they would stimulate shirking by Indian workers. The first Bengal famine of 1770 is estimated to have taken nearly one-third of the population. The famines continued until independence in 1948, with the Bengal Famine of 1943-44 -- among the most devastating-- killing 3-4 million Indians during World War II.

Related Topics:
India - Tamil Nadu - Bihar - Bengal - Afghanistan - Second Anglo-Afghan War - William Digby - 1948 - Bengal Famine - World War II

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In 1966, there was a 'near miss' in Bihar, when the USA allocated 900,000 tons of grain to fight the famine. It is the closest independent India came to a famine and is insightful into the workings of a democratic government that will even beg and borrow to avert disasters such as these.

Related Topics:
1966 - Bihar - USA

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It is also interesting to note the observations of the Famine Commission of 1880, in light of the notion that food distribution is more to blame for famines than food scarcity. They observed that each province in British India, including Burma, had a surplus of foodgrains, and the annual surplus was 5.16 million tons (Bhatia, 1970). At that time, annual export of rice and other grains from India was approximately one million tons.

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Vietnam

Various famines have occurred in Vietnam. Japanese occupation during World War II caused the Vietnamese Famine of 1945 which caused 2 million deaths. Following the unification of the country after the Vietnam War, Vietnam briefly experienced a famine in the 1980s which prompted many people to flee the country.

Related Topics:
World War II - Vietnamese Famine of 1945 - Vietnam War

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Famine in Europe

Western Europe

The Great Famine of 1315-1317 (or to 1322) was the first crisis that would strike Europe in the 14th century, millions in northern Europe would die over an extended number of years, marking a clear end to the earlier period of growth and prosperity during the 11th and 12th centuries. Starting with bad weather in the spring of 1315, universal crop failures lasted until the summer of 1317, from which Europe did not fully recover until 1322. It was a period marked by extreme levels of criminal activity, disease and mass death, infanticide, and cannibalism. It had consequences for Church, State, European society and future calamities to follow in the 14th century.

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The seventeenth century was a period of change for the food producers of Europe. For centuries they had lived primarily as subsistence farmers in a feudal system. They had obligations to their lords, who had suzerainty over the land tilled by their peasants. The lord of a fief would take a portion of the crops and livestock produced during the year. Peasants generally tried to minimize the amount of work they had to put into agricultural food production. Their lords rarely pressured them to increase their food output, except when the population started to increase, at which time the peasants were likely to increase the production themselves. More land would be added to cultivation until there was no more available and the peasants were forced to take up more labour-intensive methods of production. Nonetheless, they generally tried to work as little as possible, valuing their time to do other things such as hunting, fishing or relaxing, as long as they had enough food to feed their families. It was not in their interest to produce more than they could eat or store themselves.

Related Topics:
Feudal system - Lord - Peasant - Hunt - Fishing - Relax

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During the seventeenth century, continuing the trend of previous centuries, there was an increase in market driven agriculture. Farmers, people who rented land in order to make a profit off of the product of the land, employing wage labour, became increasingly common, particularly in western Europe. It was in their interest to produce as much as possible on their land in order to sell it to areas that demanded that product. They produced guaranteed surpluses of their crop every year if they could. Farmers paid their labourers in money, increasing the commercialization of rural society. This commercialization had a profound impact on the behaviour of peasants. Farmers were interested in increasing labour input into their lands, not decreasing it as subsistence peasants were.

Related Topics:
Market - Farmer - Wage labour - Western Europe - Crop - Money - Rural - Commercialization

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Subsistence peasants were also increasingly forced to commercialize their activities because of increasing taxes. Taxes that had to be paid to central governments in money forced the peasants to produce crops to sell. Sometimes they produced industrial crops, but they would find ways to increase their production in order to meet both their subsistence requirements as well as their tax obligations. Peasants also used the new money to purchase manufactured goods. The agricultural and social developments encouraging increased food production were gradually taking place throughout the sixteenth century, but were spurred on more directly by the adverse conditions for food production that Europe found itself in the early seventeenth century — there was a general cooling trend in the Earth's temperature starting at the beginning end of the sixteenth century.

Related Topics:
Tax - Industrial crop

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The 1590s saw the worst famines in centuries across all of Europe, except in certain areas, notably the Netherlands. Famine had been relatively rare during the sixteenth century. The economy and population had grown steadily as subsistence populations tend to when there is an extended period of relative peace (most of the time). Subsistence peasant populations will almost always increase when possible since the peasants will try to spread the work to as many hands as possible. Although peasants in areas of high population density, such as northern Italy, had learned to increase the yields of their lands through techniques such as promiscuous culture, they were still quite vulnerable to famines, forcing them to work their land even more intensively.

Related Topics:
1590s - Promiscuous culture

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Famine is a very destabilizing and devastating occurrence. The prospect of starvation led people to take desperate measures. When scarcity of food became apparent to peasants, they would sacrifice long term prosperity for short term survival. They would kill their draught animals, leading to lowered production in subsequent years. They would eat their seed corn, sacrificing next year's crop in the hope that more seed could be found. Once those means had been exhausted, they would take to the road in search of food. They migrated to the cities where merchants from other areas would be more likely to sell their food, as cities had a stronger purchasing power than did rural areas. Cities also administered relief programs and bought grain for their populations so that they could keep order. With the confusion and desperation of the migrants, crime would often follow them. Many peasants resorted to banditry in order to acquire enough to eat.

Related Topics:
Starvation - Draught animal - Seed - Crime - Bandit

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One famine would often lead to difficulties in following years because of lack of seed stock or disruption of routine, or perhaps because of less available labour. Famines were often interpreted as signs of God's displeasure. They were seen as the removal, by God, of his gifts to the people of the Earth. Elaborate religious processions and rituals were made to prevent God's wrath in the form of famine.

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The great famine of the 1590s began the period of famine and decline in the seventeenth century. The price of grain, all over Europe was high, as was the population. Various types of people were vulnerable to the succession of bad harvests that occurred throughout the 1590s in different regions. The increasing number of wage labourers in the countryside were vulnerable because they had no food of their own, and their meager living was not enough to purchase the expensive grain of a bad crop year. Town labourers were also at risk because their wages would be insufficient to cover the cost of grain, and to make matters worse, they often received less money in bad crop years since the disposable income of the wealthy was spent on grain. Often unemployment would be the result of the increase in grain prices, leading to ever increasing numbers of urban poor.

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All areas of Europe were badly affected by the famine in these periods, especially rural areas. The Netherlands were able to escape most of the damaging effects of the famine, though the 1590s were still difficult years there. Actual famine did not occur, for the Amsterdam grain trade guaranteed that there would always be something to eat in the Netherlands although hunger was prevalent.

Related Topics:
Amsterdam - Baltic

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The Netherlands had the most commercialized agriculture in all of Europe at this time. They grew many industrial crops such as flax, hemp, and hops. Agriculture became increasingly specialized and efficient. As a result, productivity and wealth increased, allowing the Netherlands to maintain a steady food supply. By the 1620s the economy was even more developed, so the country was able to avoid the hardships of that period of famine with even greater impunity.

Related Topics:
Flax - Hemp - Hops

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The years around 1620 saw another period of famines sweep across Europe. These famines were generally less severe than the famines of twenty five years earlier, but they were nonetheless quite serious in many areas.

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Other areas of Europe have known famines much more recently. France saw famines as recently as the nineteenth century. Famine still occurred in eastern Europe during the 20th century.

Related Topics:
France - 20th century

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The frequency of famine can vary with climate changes. For example, during the little ice age of the 15th-18th centuries, European famines grew more frequent than they had been during previous centuries.

Related Topics:
Little ice age - 15th - 18th

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Because of the frequency of famine in many societies it has long been a chief concern of governments and other authorities. In pre-industrial Europe, preventing famine, and ensuring timely food supplies was one of the chief concerns of many governments. They had various tools at their disposal to alleviate famines, including price controls, purchasing stockpiles of food from other areas, rationing, and regulation of production. Most governments were concerned by famine because it could lead to revolt and other forms of social disruption.

Related Topics:
Price controls - Rationing - Revolt

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In contrast, the Irish Potato Famine (1845-1849) was in no small part the result of policies of the Whig government of the United Kingdom under Lord Russell. Unlike a government facing revolt at home, the London-based government stood by its commitment to laissez-faire economics even in the face of massive starvation in Ireland.

Related Topics:
Irish Potato Famine (1845-1849) - Whig - United Kingdom - Lord Russell - London - Laissez-faire - Ireland

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Italy

The harvest failures were devastating for the northern Italian economy. The economy of the area had recovered well from the previous famines, but the famines from 1618-21 coincided because of a period of war in the area. The economy did not recover fully for centuries. There were serious famines in the late 1640s and less severe ones in the 1670s throughout northern Italy.

Related Topics:
Italian - 1618 - 21 - 1640s - 1670s

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England

England also lagged behind the Netherlands, but by 1650 their agricultural industry was commercialized on a wide scale. The last peace-time famine in England was in 1623-24. There were still periods of hunger, as in the Netherlands, but there were no more famines as such.

Related Topics:
1650 - 1623 - 24

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Iceland

In 1783 the volcano Laki in south-central Iceland erupted. The lava caused little direct damage but ash and sulfur dioxide spewed out over most of the country and three-quarters of the island's livestock perished. In the following famine around ten thousand people died, one-fifth of the population of Iceland.

Related Topics:
1783 - Volcano - Iceland

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Russia and USSR

Main article: Famines in Russia and USSR.

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Droughts and famines in Imperial Russia are known to have happened every 10-13 years, with average droughts happening every 5-7 years. Famines continued in the Soviet era, most famously the Holodomor in Ukraine (1932-1933). The last major famine in the USSR happened in 1946 due to the severe drought.

Related Topics:
Imperial Russia - Soviet - Holodomor - Ukraine - 1932 - 1933 - 1946 - Drought

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