{"id":4274,"date":"2012-05-29T18:12:06","date_gmt":"2012-05-29T18:12:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/prayables\/?p=4274"},"modified":"2012-05-29T18:26:08","modified_gmt":"2012-05-29T18:26:08","slug":"book-review-the-last-hunger-season-by-roger-thurow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayables\/2012\/05\/book-review-the-last-hunger-season-by-roger-thurow.html","title":{"rendered":"Book Review: The Last Hunger Season by Roger Thurow"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Imagine spending a year living among the poorest of the world\u2019s poor: the African farmer. That\u2019s what award-winning journalist Roger Thurow did beginning in the winter of 2011. He wrote the awe-inspiring book: The Last Hunger Season: A Year in an African Farm Community on the Brink of Change.<\/p>\n

The Last Hunger Season is a well-told story of scarcity and hope. The author chooses four farmers, Leonida, Rasoa, Zipporah, and Francis. He takes the time to understand their situation and challenges as he follows their progress from planting to harvest. Education is one of the values populates the farmer\u2019s stories. They believe that the cycle of poverty will end by educating their children. We learn from the author\u2019s observation of Rasoa and her husband, \u201cThey had both put all their chips on education, betting that somehow they could cheat the hunger season.\u201d<\/p>\n

How to cheat the hunger season is the prevalent theme throughout the book. We get a good history of the hunger problem and also an up-to-date report on the current politics of hunger in the United States. Former congressman Tony Hall led a successful hunger fast protesting proposed cuts in poverty-focused foreign aid. \u201cMore than 80,000 appeals arrived in Washington. They contained a simple message: It is wrong, morally and religiously; to focus our budget cuts on the people who are already hurting and make them hurt more.\u201c<\/p>\n

There\u2019s actually a solution to the hunger problem that\u2019s working. It comes in the form of One Acre Fund. OAF is an innovative social enterprise organization. \u201cThe \u2018social aspect\u2019 was to banish the hunger season; the \u2018enterprise\u2019 part was to do it as an efficient business. \u201d We learn in his book about its founder Andrew Youn. He came up with the idea while he was pursuing his MBA at Northwestern University\u2019s Kellogg School of Business Management. His operation provides basic farm inputs, training, and access to markets to poor farm families in Africa. It\u2019s an astounding success.<\/p>\n

You\u2019ll read about courage, despair, and always an unwavering faith in God and man to bring about a \u201cLast Hunger Season.\u201d One particularly touching scene was described taking place at the local church in Lutacho. The One Acre Fund farmers gathered for their first training session. \u201cA banner draped on the wall behind the simple altar proclaimed, \u2018To this day, I have had help from God and so I stand here testifying to both great and small.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s one thing to read about people who are hungry. It\u2019s quite another to find a book that tells a story so compelling, and uplifting. \u201cThe Last Hunger Season\u201d does a good job of providing the reader with new information in an interesting way. Better still, it transfers the hope of the four One Acre Fund farm families, to the reader. There\u2019s none among us who can’t use just a little more hope. It’s an inspiration to read \u201cThe Last Hunger Season.\u201d Thanks be to God!<\/p>\n

PURCHASE IT NOW!<\/strong><\/em>
\nTHE LAST HUNGER SEASON: A YEAR IN AN AFRICAN FARM COMMUNITY ON THE BRINK OF CHANGE<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

READ MORE ABOUT IT, A MIRACLE IN OUR TIME!<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Imagine spending a year living among the poorest of the world\u2019s poor: the African farmer. That\u2019s what award-winning journalist Roger Thurow did beginning in the winter of 2011. He wrote the awe-inspiring book: The Last Hunger Season: A Year in an African Farm Community on the Brink of Change. 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