The global village

Some time ago I heard about the failure of the Florida orange crop. The USA would have to get its morning juice from Brazil.

Shortly afterwards the own-label orange juice disappeared from our supermarket shelves, leaving just the premium brands. We switched to "10 fruit vitamin enriched nectar" and the kids were happy with that.

Now the own-label juice is back.

There's a worldwide rice shortage, caused by various factors including the rising popularity of meat in Asian countries, biofuels, drought and oil prices. Wheat and other staples, too. In Rome a summit is meeting to try to improve the world's nutrition.

We really all do belong to one another. It's not just survival of the fitter.

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