history of meals for millions, soy, and freedom from ... - SoyInfo Center

• Summary: A large photo shows the Freedoms Foundation
medal and three American children presenting cans of MPF
to Fumiko Miyagi. The caption reads: “Fumiko Miyagi of
Japan, guest of the American Soybean Association at its
Minneapolis [Minnesota] convention, expresses gratitude to
Minneapolis children whose penny-wisdom and pennypower
sent 3¢ meals of Multi-Purpose Food (MPF) to flood
victims in Japan. Also expressing interest in this new role of
American soybeans as a liberator of malnourished people is
Albert Dimond, president of the American Soybean
Association. Displayed at the convention exhibit of the nonprofit
Meals for Millions Foundation is the Freedoms
Foundation medal it was awarded for ‘outstanding
achievement in bringing about a better understanding of the
American way of life’ by distribution of MPF free in
distressed areas of the world. Miss Miyagi, a Tokyo art
teacher and women’s club leader, is president of the
Japanese Meals for Millions affiliate.” Note: This is the
earliest English-language document seen (Nov. 2002) that
uses the word “malnourished.”
111. Walley, Ersel. 1957. Soybeans around the world. It
would take 400 million bushels of soybeans to meet
minimum needs of babies and growing children alone in the
Orient. Soybean Digest. Sept. p. 30-32.
• Summary: The author made a world tour studying
soybeans, including visits to Hawaii, Japan and other parts
of Asia, and Italy. He studied production of soy milk in
Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Bangkok (Thailand). In Taiwan he
visited a soya milk plant which was established “by our
good friend and American Soybean Association pioneer, Dr.
H.W. Miller. In Hong Kong, the ‘peek hole’ and gap in the
Bamboo Curtain, we found many small soya food producers
and no doubt the largest and most successful soya milk
plant to be found anywhere [Hong Kong Soya Bean
Products Co. Ltd., makers of Vitasoy].” Hong Kong is the
place where competition between soybeans from Red China
and the USA is said to meet head-on. “May I voice my
conclusion that Red China needs in its domestic economy
more soybeans than it can possibly produce.
“A trip to southeastern and south Asia included good
and sufficient visits to Thailand (Siam), Burma, India, and
Pakistan. Of these countries, Pakistan is the only one that
has soybean production of mention and here the total
production is less than 1 million bushels per year.”
A photo shows Walley. Address: Part president and
chairman of Market Development Committee, American
Soybean Assoc.
112. Abrahams, Maurice. 1957. Re: Failure of UNICEF
report on nutrition in Brazil to even mention the large
production of soybeans in Brazil. Letter to Ernest R.
Chamberlain, Meals for Millions Foundation, Los Angeles,
California, Oct. 21. 1-2 p.
MEALS FOR MILLIONS, SOY, AND FREEDOM FROM HUNGER 50
© Copyright Soyinfo Center 2011
• Summary: “Mr. Abrahams, in a self-described ‘fine
frenzy,’ told Mr. Chamberlain that a March 1957 UNICEF
report (E/ICEF/ 1.1028) authored by Dr. Charles Glen King
and entitled Recommendations for Further Development of
UNICEF-Aided Nutrition Programmes in Central America,
Panama, Peru, and Brazil, contained ‘not a word’ about the
100,000 metric tons of soybeans per year grown in Brazil
that could be used for human nutrition. In Mr. Abrahams’
opinion the failure to mention soybeans was not the result of
a ‘mere carelessness,’ but rather because Dr. King ‘is one of
those who still do not believe in soya and, consequently, are
reluctant to believe in M-P-F’” [MPF] (H. Roberts 1967, p.
177).
Note: More than 3 years later, on 22 Jan. 1961, after an
insightful and explosive speech that Dr. Henry Borsook had
delivered to the Second Annual Inter-American Food
Congress, Miami Beach, Florida (9 June 1959, which
criticized UNICEF), Mr. Chamberlain brought up the same
subject in a letter to Maurice Abrahams: “Personally I fail to
see how UNICEF could be so self-righteous when they
published a survey that did not even acknowledge the
existence of soybeans in Brazil, much less their nutritive
value–in a study that was supposed to be thorough and to
lay the groundwork for upgrading nutrition” (quoted by H.
Roberts 1967, p. 190). Address: Brazil.
113. Parpia, H.A.B.; Swaminathan, M.; Subrahmanyan, V.
1957. Plan for the manufacture of Indian multipurpose food.
Food Science (Mysore, India) 6:96-99.
• Summary: The article begins: “Almost all of the dietary
surveys carried out in India have shown that the
overwhelming majority of the people are malnourished.”
International organizations such as F.A.O. and W.H.O.
recommend that people consume 2,600 calories of food per
day and 65 gm of protein, yet the average Indian consumes
only 1,600 to 1,900 calories per day and 45 gm of protein.
“Almost 90% of the protein in the Indian diet is of
vegetable origin, and therefore, not of high biological value
as the animal proteins.” The cause of this lack of “protective
foods” is India’s “extremely low per capita income.”
All of these facts indicate the need for India to develop
an inexpensive, well balanced, protein-rich food to
supplement the Indian diet. “Work was started in this
direction at the Central Food Technological Research
Institute, Mysore, and a cheap food of vegetable origin
fortified with essential vitamins and minerals has been
developed using the indigenous raw materials, viz., specially
prepared groundnut flour and Bengalgram flour. This is
similar in almost all respects to the multi-purpose food
which was developed by Borsook using the soyabean grits.”
Address: Central Food Technological Research Inst.
(CFTRI), Mysore, India.