Hidden Hunger: Gender and the Politics of Smarter Foods

Hidden Hunger: Gender and the Politics of Smarter Foods
ISBN-10
0801467683
ISBN-13
9780801467684
Category
Technology & Engineering
Pages
240
Language
English
Published
2013-02-15
Publisher
Cornell University Press
Author
Aya Hirata Kimura

Description

For decades, NGOs targeting world hunger focused on ensuring that adequate quantities of food were being sent to those in need. In the 1990s, the international food policy community turned its focus to the "hidden hunger" of micronutrient deficiencies, a problem that resulted in two scientific solutions: fortification, the addition of nutrients to processed foods, and biofortification, the modification of crops to produce more nutritious yields. This hidden hunger was presented as a scientific problem to be solved by "experts" and scientifically engineered smart foods rather than through local knowledge, which was deemed unscientific and, hence, irrelevant. In Hidden Hunger, Aya Hirata Kimura explores this recent emphasis on micronutrients and smart foods within the international development community and, in particular, how the voices of women were silenced despite their expertise in food purchasing and preparation. Kimura grounds her analysis in case studies of attempts to enrich and market three basic foods—rice, wheat flour, and baby food—in Indonesia. She shows the power of nutritionism and how its technical focus enhanced the power of corporations as a government partner while restricting public participation in the making of policy for public health and food. She also analyzes the role of advertising to promote fortified foodstuffs and traces the history of Golden Rice, a crop genetically engineered to alleviate vitamin A deficiencies. Situating the recent turn to smart food in Indonesia and elsewhere as part of a long history of technical attempts to solve the Third World food problem, Kimura deftly analyzes the intersection of scientific expertise, market forces, and gendered knowledge to illuminate how hidden hunger ultimately defined women as victims rather than as active agents.

Other editions

Similar books

  • Animal Sciences: The Biology, Care, and Production of Domestic Animals, Fourth Edition
    By John R. Campbell, M. Douglas Kenealy, Karen L. Campbell

    Timberlake claimed in 1980 that a fundamental problem with Singer's work is the lack of an adequate definition of suffering ...

  • Resilient Agriculture: Cultivating Food Systems for a Changing Climate
    By Laura Lengnick

    3. D. Layne. 2013. Tree Fruit: Protecting Your Investment. American/Western Fruit Grower, September/October. 4. R. Snyder and J. Melu-Abreu. 2005. Frost ...

  • Biodesign: The Process of Innovating Medical Technologies
    By Stefanos Zenios, Josh Makower, Paul Yock

    At that time, these were in the low $10s of millions. ... be a good partner going forward, even though it takes longer to get the deal done," offered Chess.

  • Advanced Signal Processing: A Concise Guide
    By Amir-Homayoon Najmi, Todd Moon

    [ 59 ] S. Kotz , T. J. Kozubowski , and K. Podgorski , The Laplace ... valued signal processing : The proper way to deal with impropriety , ” IEEE Trans .

  • Resources for Technical Communication
    By Pearson Education, Pearson Education Staff, David P Pearson Education

    Some documents are annotated; some are left without annotations to provide more flexibility for instructors. This booklet can be packaged at no additional cost with any Longman title in technical communication.

  • Chemistry: An Introduction to General, Organic, and Biological Chemistry; Chemistry Study Pack Version 2.0 CD-ROM; The Chemistry of Life CD-ROM;...
    By Karen C. Timberlake

    Chemistry: An Introduction to General, Organic, and Biological Chemistry; Chemistry Study Pack Version 2.0 CD-ROM; The Chemistry of Life CD-ROM;...

  • Poultry Science: Fifth Edition
    By Colin G. Scanes, Karen D. Christensen

    The emission rates for ammonia (Casey et al., 2006): • Layers: 116 g NH3 per AU (AU or animal unit or 500 kg). • Broilers: 135 g NH3 per AU (AU or animal unit or 500 kg). Emission rates in different reports vary from less than either 10 ...

  • Solid State Materials Chemistry
    By Patrick M. Woodward, Pavel Karen, John S. O. Evans

    [45] B.F. Hoskins, R. Robson, “Design and construction of a new class of scaffolding-like materials comprising infinite polymeric frameworks of 3D-linked molecular rods. A reappraisal of the zinc cyanide and cadmium cyanide structures ...

  • Abbreviations Dictionary
    By Dean A. Stahl, Karen Landen

    ... Tallest Mountain Mount Robson—12,972 feet or 3,954 meters—in the Canadian Rockies Canada's Westernmost City Dawson, Yukon Canada's Westernmost Point in Yukon Territory just east of Alaska's Demarcation Point Canary Islands' Largest ...

  • Agriculture: A Very Short Introduction
    By Paul Brassley, Richard Soffe

    ACCOUNTING Christopher Nobes ADVERTISING Winston Fletcher AFRICAN AMERICAN RELIGION Eddie S. Glaude Jr AFRICAN HISTORY ... Hugh Bowden ALGEBRA Peter M. Higgins AMERICAN HISTORY Paul S. Boyer AMERICAN IMMIGRATION David A. Gerber AMERICAN ...