Fat Tuesday!

Back when our ancestors were hunting and gathering, men did not have to worry about their women asking them the now cliched joke, "do I look fat in this?"  And men then could easily see their own penises because they did not have over-sized waists that blocked everything down.

Now, we don't have to worry about hunting and gathering.  We worry about fat though. A lot.  Abundance has become a problem.  A huge problem.  Even in the continent that has long been a poster-child for poverty and starvation!

In Africa, the world’s poorest continent, malnutrition is stubbornly widespread and millions of people are desperately hungry, with famine conditions looming in some war-torn countries.
But in many places, growing economies have led to growing waistlines. Obesity rates in sub-Saharan Africa are shooting up faster than in just about anywhere else in the world, causing a public health crisis that is catching Africa, and the world, by surprise.

Obesity is a not merely a public health issue, it now comes across as a pandemic!

The causes are the same:

Many Africans are eating more junk food, much of it imported. They are also getting much less exercise, as millions of people abandon a more active farming life to crowd into cities, where they tend to be more sedentary. More affordable cars and a wave of motorbike imports also mean that fewer Africans walk to work.

The older I get, the more I am pissed off that a whole bunch of smart and talented people spend their lives creating problems for humans.  "Food scientists" create newer and unhealthy junk foods. MBAs devise devilish marketing strategies to trap especially the young and the poor. And more.  Can't these talented devils use their brain power do something meaningful for humans, instead of being the glorified drug-dealers in lab coats and suits that they are, all in the name of "making money"?

Chile, which was ruined by the Chicago Boys who advised the strongman Pinochet, is on a hyperdrive against obesity:

They killed Tony the Tiger. They did away with Cheetos’ Chester Cheetah. They banned Kinder Surprise, the chocolate eggs with a hidden toy.
The Chilean government, facing skyrocketing rates of obesity, is waging war on unhealthy foods with a phalanx of marketing restrictions, mandatory packaging redesigns and labeling rules aimed at transforming the eating habits of 18 million people.
Nutrition experts say the measures are the world’s most ambitious attempt to remake a country’s food culture, and could be a model for how to turn the tide on a global obesity epidemic that researchers say contributes to four million premature deaths a year.

The modern (junk) food industry goes after kids with all kinds of marketing gimmicks.  They are powerful child abusers, against whom most parents are simply powerless.  I agree with the Chilean politician, Guido Girardi, who "publicly assailed big food companies as “21st century pedophiles.”  Pedophiles in suits!

Kamadhenu in the lab

I am beginning to worry that we are seriously underestimating how much we humans are accelerating global climate change.  The latest came from a gathering with old friends, who joked that I am not fit to live in the US.  Unfit because ... I don't consume alcohol, did not eat "non-veg," and did not even have ice cream!

Consumption in the old country has grown beyond my wildest imagination.  It is a sign of prosperity, no doubt.  People look well-fed, and restaurants to suit various budgets are so many all around that it even comes across as if the food and beverage industry is the industry here.  A friend says that there is a restaurant that serves "Mexican dosai," which says everything about how limited my imagination is.

More cars on the road. More two-wheelers, and auto-rickshaws. Kids walking around with chocolates and juices.  Every other person is walking or driving with smartphones, which they check constantly.  The airport crowd beats the literal and metaphorical Grand Central Station.

But, all these are the mere beginnings of consumption.  And this will rapidly increase in the next decade.  If carbon is the fuel that makes pretty much all the consumption possible, and if the coming increase in consumption will be continued to be energized by carbon, then ...

And this is merely in one city.  There are other cities. And other countries. And that huge and growing population in sub-Saharan Africa.

Now, back to the gathering, only two other guys stayed with the "veg" options.  The rest were kidding that the vegetables were contaminating the "non veg."  If only the West understood India for what it is, and not as a land of a billion vegetarians!  Rare is a staunch vegetarian, like this guy, who thoughtfully took me to this place for a fabulous meal.

When the animal protein consumption is growing this rapidly in India, and will grow in other countries as well--we have clear evidence that with prosperity, humans begin to consume a lot more animal protein--one can easily draw a line to climate change, right?

This piece reminds us about that connection:

According to the United Nations, raising animals for food contributes more greenhouse gas emissions than all forms of transportation combined. The climate impact of animal agriculture is staggering, as are the other environmental problems associated with it. “The reality is that it takes massive amounts of land, water, fertilizer, oil and other resources to produce meat,” says global relief charity Oxfam, “significantly more than it requires to grow other nutritious and delicious kinds of food.”

So, what can be done?  Most people are not going to become vegetarians.  We need to manufacture animal protein that will taste and look like beef or chicken or ...

"Second domestication" might be the answer:

Whereas our ancestors domesticated wild animals into livestock, today Memphis Meats and others are beginning to domesticate those animals’ cells. And from one single cell of a cow, you could feed an entire village, offering real hope that we may be able to satiate humanity’s demand for meat without destroying our planet in the process.

Yep, lab-grown meat.

The history of agriculture has largely been about producing more food with fewer resources. Today, cellular agriculture is offering us the capacity to do just that while lightening our footprint on the planet in ways that in the past was always mere science fiction.
Perhaps it was put best by Drew Endy, a Stanford University synthetic biologist, who says of these kinds of technologies: “We can transition from living on Earth to living with Earth.”

May you live in exciting times!