Nèdeem Elmahjoub's blog

How food is used as a weapon

“Disgusting!”  Feeding in stables a  “system of cell prison”  for the animals.  “ In these prisons animals are born and remain there until they are killed off. The question is whether or not this system connected to the breeding system that grows animals in an abnormal way by aborting bones in order to transform them to mere meat and a bulk of fat—whereas earlier (before 1848) animals remained active by staying under free air as much as possible—will ultimately result in serious deterioration of life force?” Karl Marx, Marx-Engels Archives, Sign. B. 106, 336; quoted in Kohei Saito, “Why Ecosocialism Needs Marx,”  Monthly Review  68, no. 6 (November 2016): 62. See also Holderness, “The Origins of High Farming,” 160–61. Capitalist production, war and the current food crisis

 

I have just finished reading Global Middle East Into The Twenty-First Century . Apart from a couple of essays which I have found dry, the collection of 24 short essays is really worth reading.   It is accessible to both students and those who are eager to read about different topics related to the region in its global context, from music, food and Levantines in Latin America to oil, Egyptian cotton, Mo Salah and ports of the Persian Gulf...

Nature's wake-up call to complacent civilisation

A book review A History of the World in Seven Cheap Things (The book is currently half price on Verso website and even cheaper as an e-book)

"The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that global food production is more than adequate to feed the world. For instance,  2,577 million tons of cereal  were forecasted to be produced in 2016, with 13 million tons leftover after demand is met. Worldwide we already  produce  over two thousand kilocalories (kcal) per person on average, the minimum level of energy humans require according to  USDA dietary guidelines . Still, with all this production,  780 million people are living with chronic hunger , many of them living in rural areas dependent upon agriculture for their livelihoods." Capital's hunger in abundance

He was an antidote to the likes of Gordon Ramsay and Jamie Oliver Bourdain’s political transformation happened on the road to Beirut. He landed there in 2006, days before Israel bombarded the city. The episode is a verite documentary of a society upended in an instant. Lebanese journalist  Kim Ghattas  says that as a result, “Bourdain developed a new approach that used conversations about food to tell the story and politics of the countries he visited in ways that hard news couldn’t.” Anthony Bourdain (1956-2018)

Hong Kong by J. A. (FT)

Mechanisms of imperialism

It's funny, but it isn't English humour "Many" regret their Brexit vote because they are losing Marmite