News : VS student Monaghan tackles world hunger; presents at World Food Prize event

This last spring, Vinton-Shellsburg High School student Shane wrote and presented a paper at the Iowa Food Prize. His paper addressed the relationship between national security, terrorism and food insecurity in Mali and how hunger cannot be addressed there without also addressing terrorism, corruption and national security. Shane was one of 160 students world-wide to be named a Borlaug Scholar and was selected to present and defend his paper at the World Food Prize in October. There, students from all over the world were broken into groups of eight. Shane's group included students from Iowa, Ohio, New Jersey, Mexico, Virgin Islands, China, and India and this group participated in all activities together. It provided a great opportunity for them to make friends and get to know more about the topics that others wrote about. In Shane's group, the other students wrote about water salinity, water shortages, farmers growing food more for calories rather than for nutrition and a variety of social issues that impact food security. Shane, along with other students who competed, may apply for an international internship. Some recent interns also presented. Shane's group leader interned in Thailand, where he grew crops in test plots, charting variables and productivity for that environment. The students presented and defended their papers to a panel of five international judges. Some of the speakers at the conference included the president of Sierra Leone, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture and former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack, Mexico's Secretary of Agriculture, Liberia's Minister of Agriculture, Sen, Tom Harkin, Gov. Terry Branstad and former Lt. Gov. Sally Pedersen. Topics included issues facing the speakers' home countries, food and water disparity, nutritional issues, and innovations. For example, the gentleman from Mexico spoke about the shortage of water and the poor quality of their water and how they are harvesting mountain water to be used for both irrigation and consumption. Senator Harkin spoke about how by 2050, the world population will be 9.5 billion. Because the US has such a strong ag industry, we will be leaders of a "green revolution". Through technological advances, we will be able to produce more food on less land. Currently 1 in 6 people world wide live in hunger. Meals were reflective of the speaker's home countries or foods that are good for sustaining populations in countries that don't have a lot of agricultural production. For example, the Laureate was from India and working in Mexico so they had foods from those two countries when he spoke. They also one meal that was mostly soy based foods, which was one of the more popular meals. At the Hunger Banquet, they split everyone into three groups which mirrored how the world's population is split up. About 15% were 1st class (earning above $12,000 annually), 35% were 2nd class ($1,000 - $12,000 annual income) and 50% were 3rd class (under $1,000 annual income). First class folks were served a really nice meal, The middle class were served rice and beans and could get up to two servings, the 3rd class received a Dixie cup size serving of rice and water which is what most third world, third class citizens eat in a day. They also got to tour a lab at Syngenta Seed Company. He learned there that before a hybrid seed can be released to the market, it goes through years of testing and all the corn is burned so that it cannot be accidentally transferred to another field. He learned that this industry has a fair amount of corporate espionage and employees are held to strict non-disclosure and no-compete agreements. When Syngenta comes up with a good hybrid seed, they protect the genetic makeup information closely until it can all the testing is done. If they find one of their seeds has a poor genetic makeup, they share the data to the public so that others can test it or be aware of the flaws. In addition to Shane's involvement with the World Food Prize, he volunteers at two mobile food pantries every month--one in Brandon and one in Vinton. He is interested in working to solve world hunger and hopes to be selected for an international internship. See Shane's paper HERE.