journalist commentary:
by Ivan Head (1996)The following excerpts are from remarks made by Prof. Ivan Head on Oct. 25 at United Nations headquarters in New York City. Head, UBC law professor and chair in South-North Studies, gave the keynote address at the UN's1996 World Food Day ceremony.

Worldwide, no other single factor so reveals the commonality, yet so emphasizes the disparities, of the human family as does food. The daily consumption of food is so natural and so necessary as to be an instinctive human act. Each one of the almost six billion of us, whatever our means, wherever we dwell, is driven by this need. Yet no other single act so demonstrates our differences. The joy, the satisfaction, and the well-being that those of us in this council chamber experience as we share a meal with family and friends -- often in delightful circumstances and with ample portions -- simply cannot be compared with the privations and the limitations of those 800 million, or the many others worldwide who exist on the margins of hunger.