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Last Hunger Session

Last Hunger Session

by RogerThurow (Author)

  • Used

    Hardcover 2012

    $4.28
Synopsis

This story of a group of Kenyan farmers working to transcend lives of dire poverty and hunger illuminates the challenges, and vital necessity, of transforming Africa's agricultural sector. Africa's small farmers, who comprise two-thirds of its population, toil in a time warp, living and working essentially as they did in the 1930s. Without mechanized equipment, fertilizer, or irrigation; using primitive storage facilities, roads and markets; lacking capital, credit and insurance; they harvest only one-quarter the yields of Western farmers, half of which spoil before getting to market. But in 2011, one group of farmers in Kenya came together to try to change their odds for success - and their families' futures. Roger Thurow spent a year following their progress. In The Last Hunger Season , the intimate dramas of the farmers; lives unfold amidst growing awareness that to feed the world's growing population, food production must double by 2050. How will the farmers, Africa, and a hungrier world deal with issues of water usage, land ownership, foreign investment, corruption, GMS' the changing role of women, and the politics of foreign aid?

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More Information

Format: Hardcover
 Pages: 320
 Publisher: PublicAffairs
Published: 14 Jun 2012
ISBN 10: 1610390679
ISBN 13: 9781610390675

Media Reviews
The National To understand their lives, the author ... takes us deep inside the smallholder's struggle.... Thurow has us hanging on the dramatic tensions affecting all four families: one finds the calf they'd depended on to cover future educational fees has died... Where Thurow is most effective is the interplay he weaves between hunger and policy - or its absence... Readers of The Last Hunger Season will find themselves getting caught up in these dilemmas, then breathing a sigh of relief to learn that the farmers Thurow followed in 2011 enjoyed reasonably good yields that year - seven to 20 bags of harvested maize apiece - thanks to One Acre's seeds and training. Publishers Weekly Empathetic and eye-opening.... Thurow paints a sobering but ultimately hopeful picture of a continuing food crisis in Africa and some of the things people are doing to mitigate it. Beliefnet Awe-inspiring . . . A well-told story of scarcity and hope.
Financial Times
Part of the beauty of this book is that it is not the story of foreign aid workers. Nor indeed does the author, a former Wall Street Journal reporter with decades' experience of writing about Africa and agriculture, intrude. Rather it is the tale of villagers such as Wanyama who is grappling with dilemmas familiar to millions of rural and indeed urban Africans: whether to devote scant money to health, education for the children, or food.... This book shows us why history does not have to repeat itself.
Weekender
The Last Hunger Season is as much a look at the distortions of agricultural development in Africa as it is a gritty underdog tale of hope and survival. The issue of malnutrition and hunger in children and adults living in impoverished conditions is a vast one. But Thurow does a good job not only touching on those problems but also deeply exploring the trials and tribulations associated with farming in Kenya. His voice is even-keeled, hopeful and respectful, and it's almost impo
The Washington Post
[A] warmly human account.
The National To understand their lives, the author ... takes us deep inside the smallholder's struggle.... Thurow has us hanging on the dramatic tensions affecting all four families: one finds the calf they'd depended on to cover future educational fees has died... Where Thurow is most effective is the interplay he weaves between hunger and policy - or its absence... Readers of The Last Hunger Season will find themselves getting caught up in these dilemmas, then breathing a sigh of relief to learn that the farmers Thurow followed in 2011 enjoyed reasonably good yields that year - seven to 20 bags of harvested maize apiece - thanks to One Acre's seeds and training. Publishers Weekly Empathetic and eye-opening.... Thurow paints a sobering but ultimately hopeful picture of a continuing food crisis in Africa and some of the things people are doing to mitigate it. Beliefnet Awe-inspiring . . . A well-told story of scarcity and hope.
Financial Times
Part of the beauty of this book is that it is not the story of foreign aid workers. Nor indeed does the author, a former Wall Street Journal reporter with decades' experience of writing about Africa and agriculture, intrude. Rather it is the tale of villagers such as Wanyama who is grappling with dilemmas familiar to millions of rural and indeed urban Africans: whether to devote scant money to health, education for the children, or food.... This book shows us why history does not have to repeat itself.
Weekender
The Last Hunger Season is as much a look at the distortions of agricultural development in Africa as it is a gritty underdog tale of hope and survival. The issue of malnutrition and hunger in children and adults living in impoverished conditions is a vast one. But Thurow does a good job not only touching on those problems but also deeply exploring the trials and tribulations associated with farming in Kenya. His voic
The Washington Post
 [A] warmly human account.
The National To understand their lives, the author ... takes us deep inside the smallholder's struggle.... Thurow has us hanging on the dramatic tensions affecting all four families: one finds the calf they'd depended on to cover future educational fees has died... Where Thurow is most effective is the interplay he weaves between hunger and policy - or its absence... Readers of The Last Hunger Season will find themselves getting caught up in these dilemmas, then breathing a sigh of relief to learn that the farmers Thurow followed in 2011 enjoyed reasonably good yields that year - seven to 20 bags of harvested maize apiece - thanks to One Acre's seeds and training. Publishers Weekly Empathetic and eye-opening.... Thurow paints a sobering but ultimately hopeful picture of a continuing food crisis in Africa and some of the things people are doing to mitigate it. Beliefnet Awe-inspiring . . . A well-told story of scarcity and hope.
Financial Times
 Part of the beauty of this book is that it is not the story of foreign aid workers. Nor indeed does the author, a former Wall Street Journal reporter with decades' experience of writing about Africa and agriculture, intrude. Rather it is the tale of villagers such as Wanyama who is grappling with dilemmas familiar to millions of rural and indeed urban Africans: whether to devote scant money to health, education for the children, or food.... This book shows us why history does not have to repeat itself.
Weekender
 The Last Hunger Season is as much a look at the distortions of agricultural development in Africa as it is a gritty underdog tale of hope and survival. The issue of malnutrition and hunger in children and adults living in impoverished conditions is a vast one. But Thurow does a good job not only touching on those problems but also deeply exploring the trials and tribulations associated with farming in Kenya. His voice is even-keeled, hopeful and respectful, and it's almost impossible for the reader to not be personally impacted by the stories he tells.
Author Bio
Roger Thurow is a senior fellow for global agriculture and food policy at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. For thirty years he was a reporter at The Wall Street Journal. He is the author (with Scott Kilman) of Enough: Why the World's Poorest Starve in an Age of Plenty, and the recipient of the Action Against Hunger Humanitarian Award. He lives in Chicago.