Today, The New York Times is discussing Oxfam, “The Hunger Games,” and The Harry Potter Alliance. What do these seemingly random groups have in common, you ask? Each shed light on the outcomes (real and imagined, in the case of the books and film) of food shortages in a resource-constrained world.

An excerpt: “This week, Suzanne Collins’s “The Hunger Games” hits the big screen. As the latest wildly popular young adult (Y.A.) novel becomes a film franchise, it’s not just box office dollars that will be captured, but potentially nascent citizens. At least that’s the goal of the social campaign called “Hunger Is Not a Game” which aims to connect fans to the global food justice movement.

“”The Hunger Games” devotees have long congregated on sites like Mockingjay.net, Down with the Capitol, and the “Hunger Games” Fireside Chat podcast. Now Oxfam, with its long history focused on famine relief, has joined forces with a small, fan-focused group” to encourage young people to join Oxfam’s GROW campaign to ensure everyone has enough to eat now and in the future.

Boy, that’s a lot of campaigns you say? Yes, but sometimes social change movements coming together can be a beautiful thing. Later this week, hundreds of young volunteers will set-up shop at movie theaters across the country to bring fans of the “The Hunger Games” movie on-board to GROW.

“Our members know that change isn’t easy and it requires helping others to understand what’s at the root of the problem,” said Andrew Slack, Executive Director of the Harry Potter Alliance, the sponsor organization behind “Hunger is not a Game.”

“The GROW campaign gives our members a chance to really make a difference in their communities by putting emphasis on an issue that can effect anyone from their neighbor down the street to a child tens of thousands of miles away.”

Watch this quick video to learn more

“It’s thanks to the rain that the animals graze; it’s thanks to the rain that we have food,” says Koubra Hamid, who lives with her family in Bahr el Ghazal, Chad. But she is worried.

“This year, it has not rained much, so the pastures are not good enough,” says herder Etta Brahim Senussi. “When an animal dies, it really hurts.” Photo by Andy Hall/Oxfam.

The rains haven’t come. Not enough, and not at the right times. Across the Sahel region of Africa, poor harvests, erratic and inadequate rainfall, and rising food prices are harbingers of what many predict will be a severe food crisis. Already the poorest families are struggling with hunger, and their animals are visibly weakening.

Oxfam is supporting animal feeding and health care to enable farmers and herders to weather the lean season. Photo by Andy Hall/Oxfam.

A top priority now is to prevent farmers and pastoralists from losing their cows, goats, sheep, and camels – and with them their sources of both food and income. Oxfam’s emergency programs include providing livestock with improved water sources, fodder to supplement the dwindling pasture, and vaccinations to counteract the damage drought and hunger could do to their health. (View “ Taha vaccinates 1,000 goats per day.”)

“We’re tired and frustrated,” says Hamid. “But there are also moments when we laugh with our children.”

The sky was brilliantly blue above Saturday’s climate action march in Copenhagen.  As you can see and hear in this slideshow, thousands came from around Denmark and the world to be (in the words of a Welshman I spoke to) “part of history” — and dance, and perform, and make music — to support the creation of a fair, legally binding, and strong international climate treaty.

(Organizers say 100,000 marched; Copenhagen police say around 30,000.  Typically for these kinds of rallys, the accurate head count lies somewhere between the two.)

Last winter, my husband and I took our annual trip to see our parents out West. I’m from Southern California and John’s parents moved out to Arizona a few years ago. So, we can usually see both sets within a couple weeks. And, luckily for us, the trips usually bring warmth and beauty into our lives during Boston’s dreary winters; we spend our time road tripping to places like the Grand Canyon, Sedona, and Big Sur.

A photo from my trip to the Grand Canyon. This beloved national park may have natural resources, but does that mean they should be exploited? Andrea Perera / Oxfam America.

I was thinking about that trip yesterday morning when reading the news that the new Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has cancelled oil and gas leases on 77 parcels of federal land in southeastern Utah. This move reverses the Bush administration’s decision to allow drilling on about 130,000 acres near Nine Mile Canyon, Arches National Park, and Dinosaur National Monument. When I look back at the photos from my trip to the Grand Canyon, I can’t imagine what it would be like to drop an industrial oil operation in the midst of that type of unmarred landscape. Read the rest of this entry »