6. Why Doesn't District 12 Use Any Of That Land For Farming?
I don't know if you've ever tasted a squirrel. A quick web search will return reviews ranging from "like dry chicken" to "rubbery lamb," and you can't exactly get a lot of meat from them. It may be a delicacy in District 12, but it's probably not through choice, is it? With that lush, wonderful land that Katniss goes hunting in, though, why don't the townspeople farm? It's an obvious solution, but if it's one that answered comprehensively in the book: they're not allowed to. 12 is the mining district; it's 10 and 11 that take care of livestock and agriculture respectively. Katniss isn't even supposed to be out that far, either - it may be quite simple to escape through that aforementioned gap in the fence, but that fence is a serious border that should never be crossed. The films just never actually explicitly mention the consequences. District 1's job is to make luxury goods for the Capitol; they're almost the middle class of Panem. Further and further out though, the jobs and districts just get worse. District 13, home of nuclear weapons, was obliterated and the ruins are apparently still smouldering. Maybe having to live off squirrels isn't that bad, then?
