Prepare a set of labelled cards (old business cards are excellent for this) in the following geographical proportions:
12 x South-east Asians 10 sweets between them
3 x Africans 4 sweets
1 x Russians 4 sweets
1 x Americans 10 sweets
2 x Europeans 10 sweets
2 x Latin Americans 3 sweets
Get each student to pick a card. Now take a bag of sweets and divide them.
Ask each nationality to come out in turn and share out the sweeties as shown.
Ask the class if they thought that was fair.
Who gets the most sweets per head? Who gets the least?
Assuming a recommended daily intake of 1.5 sweets, what proportion of the world’spopulation suffers from malnutrition? How many sweets would American, Russian and European citizens have to give up to ensure that the world’s population is adequately fed? How could we share out the Earth’s resources more equitably?