The Full Belly Project: A Simple Solution for World Hunger

Streamlining the Food Source for 500 Million People

Imagine coming up with a simple mechanical invention, a device made of rudimentary materials that are widely available, but with the potential to save millions of people from malnutrition and poverty. It's been done by an inventor from North Carolina and it's working because of a group called The Full Belly Project.

To an American, a peanut shelling machine might sound like an infomercial gadget, something to use while snacking in front of the TV. But in the underdeveloped countries of Africa and Asia, separating peanuts from their shells represents a major part of the hard work necessary to live.

Every day, five hundred million people around the world rely on peanuts as their major source of protein. Removing the shells, which toughen while drying in the sun, is done mainly by women and children. Spending hours at a time on this incredibly labor-intensive work results in sore, painful fingers.

Commercial peanut processors use large machines, of course, but they are obviously not feasible for people in small villages. These machines typically waste 20% to 40% of the peanuts in the process.

The problem came to the attention of the right person in 2002, when Jock Brandis visited a Peace Corps friend in the Republic of Mali, West Africa. Brandis had a career as a motion picture sound and light engineer, so he was well equipped with technical and mechanical savvy. He learned that villagers were reluctant to grow more peanuts because they had no viable mechanical means to shell them and were turning to cotton as a cash crop. Unfortunately, growing cotton depletes the soil. Peanuts, however, like all plants in the legume family, have the unique ability to take nitrogen from the air and "fix" it into the soil as they grow, actually enriching the soil.

Peanuts, or as Africans call them, ground nuts or simply "G-nuts", provide a highly nutritious food, and can be made into flour, peanut butter and oil. Growing and using them more easily would mean not only better nutrition, but an opportunity for economic development by selling the surplus.