( 3 ) 



CHAPTER I 



WAR AND FOOD 



HUNGER is playing a dominant role in human history. Con- 

 quest, Plague, Famine, and Death, the Four Horsemen of the 

 Apocalypse, are riding in this war as they rode in others. 



War plays havoc with the world's food supplies. Despite 

 the individual and collective efforts of man, world wars re- 

 duce the supply of food. 



Production Decreases and Waste Increases 



World food production decreases during wartime because 

 there is less man-labor to plow, cultivate, and harvest the 

 crops. It is difficult, if not impossible, to take fifty million 

 men from the farms and factories of the world, put them into 

 the armed forces, and still maintain world food production. 

 Even Hitler has not yet been able to devise a plan whereby 

 men can both work and fight. Women may be pressed into 

 service, but efficiency is lowered. Steel is diverted from food 

 machinery to munitions. Fertilizers are diverted from food 

 production to explosives and other war purposes. The acreage 

 of cultivated land is reduced by camps, training fields, flying 

 fields, and the like, which frequently take the fertile, level, 

 low-lying ground. Thousands of acres of crops are trampled 



