I had lunch today with a friend who also works in the communications business, and over our chicken sandwich (her) and seared salmon (me), she said to me, “How come we never heard about this worldwide famine before now?”

She was referring to, of course, the desperate shortage of grains around the world, especially in what The Economist magazine calls the “hotspots” of Africa and Afghanistan. (For a compelling photo essay on the famine in Afghanistan, see here)

A recent documentary on Radio-Canada pointed the finger squarely towards we Westerners for the rapid rise in the value of grains, especially wheat and rice, that has forced poorer countries to export their grains abroad rather than sell them at home since they can get a much better price for them elsewhere. It’s also our fault, supposedly (and I say that not without some questionable guilt) because with our push towards grain-based fuel alternatives, we have started to consume mechanically what was once consumed biologically.

The issue that is the most powerful, as my friend pointed out, is the fact that this famine short of “crept up” on us. Although there has been discussion by certain groups (World Vision among them www.famine.ca) of a growing crisis of global proportions, in general this news has reached us late and to most of my acquaintances, anyway, with some surprise.

My reaction to this is tempered by my public relations mode of thinking. The reason this news is only reaching us now is simple: because it wasn’t “news” before. A food shortage is something that happens, there is an implicit understanding, and usually somewhere else. Economic pressures, mismanaged agriculture, domination of industrial farming, droughts or receding arable land – all fodder for the back of the newspaper, or the electronic equivalent. But a famine, now that’s sexy. (Please note a heavy use of irony)

The reality is, we don’t care about things until they get to crisis proportions usually because of the “how does it affect me” factor. A simple shortage does not affect me, but a famine has the capacity to at least invoke my capacity for empathy or compassion for the victims. A shortage, which is what surely must have been happening for some time until it reached crisis proportions, simply doesn’t get the airplay or bandwidth that a famine does, with its shock value and drastic-measures-needed reaction.

This lesson applies to all crisis management, actually. The longer you can keep the news in the distant, “it doesn’t really affect me” realm, the longer you can avoid having to deal with a crisis. Unfortunately, a crisis of this magnitude is more than a PR exercise, it will take a worldwide shift in thinking to address it.