India’s food production also dropped in the last two years due to drought and other factors. Yet her population increased about twenty-five million in those same two years! Newsweek reported that in the affected areas “some 200 million Indians face the threat of a disastrous famine.”

Many other lands are affected by exploding populations that are outracing food production. Because of this worldwide crisis, the New York Times declared:

“Two-thirds of the 800 million children on the three continents [Africa, Asia and Latin America] are affected by malnutrition, according to experts in the United Nations and elsewhere. Six years ago, the United Nations warned of an ‘impending protein crisis.’ Today, the experts say, the crisis has arrived.”

The Trend Is Clear

The trend is clear​—world food production is unable to keep up with population growth.

Thus, in spite of all his advanced technology, man is not finding an answer to the world food problem. It grows worse at the very time that world population is increasing at the fastest rate in all history. Now, each year sees a net increase of about seventy-five million people on this earth!

What is now developing on a global scale was predicted several years ago. For example, among others, William and Paul Paddock in their book Famine 1975 had warned that world population growth was running ahead of food production and that a crisis could be expected in the mid-1970’s. In May 1973, a New York Times editorial commented: “It appears that the Paddock brothers’ prophecy for 1975 could begin to become a reality as early as 1974.” But the symptoms have already appeared before 1974.

Why the Shortages?

Why the food shortages? Hopes were so high just a few years ago due to ‘miracle seeds’ of rice and wheat. Yet, at the same time, world population continued to “explode,” especially in the very countries where food was already short. No matter how much of a “miracle” certain seeds may be, an acre planted in them will feed only so many people. And when people multiply faster than food, famine is inevitable.