Academic literature on the topic 'Poland Sugar cane'

Chances are you’ve heard that, around the globe, people are getting fatter. In fact, you may have read about the “epidemic” of obesity that is causing costly health problems such as heart disease, type-2 diabetes, high blood pressure, cancer, and premature death. Most scientific evidence suggests that approximately 10% of the world’s population is obese (World Health Organization [WHO] WHO 2012b; 2012c, p. 36) and that most of these people live in the northern hemisphere in wealthier countries. The WHO and other groups call obesity a preventable epidemic, like SARS, AIDS, and the flu, caused by the failure of individuals to follow scientific and other rules for increasing exercise and reducing energy intake (calories) and the consumption of specific foods such as sugars and fats (Nestle 2002; Pollan 2008; United States Department of Health and Human Services 2012; WHO 2012c). At the same time that so much attention is given to obesity, hunger and food insecurity imperil almost a billion people globally. While we hear less about the problem of hunger in Western news media, chronic hunger affects approximately 13% of the world’s population, nearly as many people now as it did in the 1970s. Most of these people live in Africa and Southeast Asia (Food and Agriculture Organization [FAO] 2012a, pp. 8–9). Many observers believe that hunger is caused by inadequate access to agricultural technologies (International Food Policy Research Institute 2012; Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation 2013; Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research 2013) or short-term problems such as war or drought (FAO 2012b). Global obesity and global hunger might be seen as independent problems, caused by the personal habits of individuals in the case of obesity or by short-term problems such as war or lack of technical knowledge in the case of hunger. In this chapter, we take a different approach by examining these two phenomena as two sides of the same coin. The causes of hunger and obesity are connected through scientific and technological applications and mediated by political and economic considerations.

The food sector is one of the most important and fastest growing branches of the Polish economy. It employs almost 15% of all employees employed in the industry. Polish manufacturers are characterised by high competitiveness both in the EU and in the world. The macroeconomic environment in recent years has been relatively stable for the development of the food industry production in Poland, but the dynamics of agricultural-food products has experienced a slight slowdown. There were also fluctuations in profitability ratios in the sector, which may have been somewhat alarming for the investors.