Deprecated (16384): The ArrayAccess methods will be removed in 4.0.0.Use getParam(), getData() and getQuery() instead. - /home/brlfuser/public_html/src/Controller/ArtileDetailController.php, line: 150
 You can disable deprecation warnings by setting `Error.errorLevel` to `E_ALL & ~E_USER_DEPRECATED` in your config/app.php. [CORE/src/Core/functions.php, line 311]
Deprecated (16384): The ArrayAccess methods will be removed in 4.0.0.Use getParam(), getData() and getQuery() instead. - /home/brlfuser/public_html/src/Controller/ArtileDetailController.php, line: 151
 You can disable deprecation warnings by setting `Error.errorLevel` to `E_ALL & ~E_USER_DEPRECATED` in your config/app.php. [CORE/src/Core/functions.php, line 311]
Warning (512): Unable to emit headers. Headers sent in file=/home/brlfuser/public_html/vendor/cakephp/cakephp/src/Error/Debugger.php line=853 [CORE/src/Http/ResponseEmitter.php, line 48]
Warning (2): Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /home/brlfuser/public_html/vendor/cakephp/cakephp/src/Error/Debugger.php:853) [CORE/src/Http/ResponseEmitter.php, line 148]
Warning (2): Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /home/brlfuser/public_html/vendor/cakephp/cakephp/src/Error/Debugger.php:853) [CORE/src/Http/ResponseEmitter.php, line 181]
News Alerts | Two more newly released reports on hunger and malnutrition

Two more newly released reports on hunger and malnutrition

Share this article Share this article
published Published on Oct 21, 2009   modified Modified on Oct 21, 2009


Global economic and financial crisis (2007-2008) coupled with food and fuel crises (2006-2008) has pushed the number of undernourished in the world to 1.02 billion during 2009, This has happened despite international food commodity prices declining from their earlier peaks, finds a newly released report of the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO, www.fao.org) titled: The State of Food Insecurity in the World Report 2009: Economic Crises-Impacts and Lessons Learnt. Although the number of undernourished people has been increasing slowly, with the onset of these crises, the number of hungry people in the world went up sharply.

The report finds that the proportion of undernourished in the total population in India has increased from 21% in 2000-02 to 22% in 2004-06. The number of undernourished people in India has increased from 223.0 million in 2000-02 to 251.5 million in 2004-06 (see the graph below). This indeed is a major challenge to achieving the millennium development goal of reducing hunger by half by the year 2015.

Graph: Number of undernourished in India (in millions)
Undernourished 
Source: Table 1, The State of Food Insecurity in the World 2009,
ftp://ftp.fao.org/docrep/fao/012/i0876e/i0876e05.pdf

The target of reducing the number of undernourished people in the world by half to no more than 420 million by 2015 will not be reached, warns the report. The reports finds that access to food improved during the 1980s and early 1990s because of stepped up agricultural investment after the global food crisis that took place in the early 1970s. However, access to food entitlements got adversely affected due to official development assistance (ODA) falling between 1995-1997 and 2004-2006, resulting in surges in the number of undernourished in most regions of the world.

The State of Food Insecurity in the World 2009 claims that the number of hungry people increased between 1995–97 and 2004–06 in all regions except Latin America and the Caribbean. However, the downward trend in this region was reversed because of the food and economic crises.

In the near future, grain prices may be determined by oil prices in the energy market as opposed to being determined by grain supply. This is because much of the energy needs would be met by diverting grains (such as maize) into biofuel production.  By the end of 2008, domestic staple food prices were still 17 percent higher in real terms than two years earlier, which resulted in a reduction in the effective purchasing power of poor consumers, who spend a substantial share of their income (often 40 percent) on staple foods.

A newly released report of the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI, www.ifpri.org) titled: Global Hunger Index (GHI)-The Challenge of Hunger: Focus on Financial Crisis and Gender Inequality finds that GHI remains distressingly high in South Asia (GHI score 23.0), which has made progress since 1990, and in Sub-Saharan Africa (GHI score 22.1), where progress has been marginal. In Sub-Saharan Africa, low government effectiveness, conflict, political instability, and high rates of HIV/ AIDS lead to high child mortality and a high proportion of people who cannot meet their calorie requirements. However, in South Asia, the low nutritional, educational, and social status of women contributes to a high prevalence of underweightedness among children under five years of age.

India’s GHI score has fallen down from 31.7 in 1990 to 23.9 in 2009. As a result of this, it ranks 65th in the GHI scores and is positioned between Togo (63rd rank) and Liberia (66th rank). India has been clubbed together with Bangladesh, Timor-Leste, and Yemen since all these countries have more than 40 percent prevalence rate of underweight children under five. The proportion of undernourished in the population came down from 24.0 percent during 1990-92 to 21.0 percent during 2003-05. The prevalence of underweightedness among children below five years has fallen down from 59.5 percent during 1988-92 to 43.5 percent during 2002-07. India has also seen substantial reduction in under five mortality rate from 11.7 percent in 1990 to 7.2 percent during 2007. Despite progress, India joins the ranks of some of the African countries where hunger, malnutrition and poverty levels are the highest in the world.

Southeast Asia (GHI score 8.7), the Near East and North Africa (GHI score 5.2), and Latin America and the Caribbean (GHI score 5.1) have made substantial gains in reducing hunger. Between 1990 and 2009, Kuwait, Tunisia, Fiji, Malaysia, and Turkey have made the largest percentage improvements in improving their GHI scores. Countries like Angola, Ethiopia, Ghana, Nicaragua, and Vietnam witnessed the largest absolute improvements in their scores. The worst performers in the 2009 GHI scores are Burundi, Chad, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Sierra Leone.

The GHI Report 2009 makes comparisons between the 2009 GHI and the 2008 Global Gender Gap Index, which is made up of four subindices: economic participation, educational attainment, political empowerment, and health and survival. It finds that higher levels of hunger are associated with lower literacy rates and access to education for women. High rates of hunger are also linked to health and survival inequalities between men and women. South Asian countries have some of the highest levels of hunger and gender inequality worldwide. India ranks 76th in the Global Gender Gap Index (GGGI) 2008, much below Sri Lanka (3rd rank) and Bangladesh (58th rank).

As policy responses to mitigate hunger and malnutrition, the report demands for nutrition interventions, such as school feeding programs and programmes for early childhood and maternal nutrition.

The report mentions that poor people around the world are facing stress as real wages and household incomes decline, jobs are lost, credit is cut, and remittances dwindle owing to the present financial crisis and recession. Since developing countries are much more integrated into the world economic system, the recent economic crisis combined with food and fuel crises have made deeper impact on the lives of poor as compared to the previous crises. India’s overall vulnerability to the economic downturn is alarming, warns the IFPRI report. 


Further readings:

The State of Food Insecurity in the World Report 2009: Economic Crises-Impacts and Lessons Learnt, http://www.fao.org/docrep/012/i0876e/i0876e00.htm:  

The State of Food Insecurity in the World 2009: Economic Crises – Impacts and Lessons Learned, October, 2009, http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/lib.nsf/db900SID/EGUA-7WSM9V?O
penDocument#

Global Hunger Index -The Challenge of Hunger: Focus on Financial Crisis and Gender Inequality, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), October, 2009, http://www.ifpri.org/sites/default/files/publications/ghi09.pdf

Global Hunger Index: Hunger Linked to Gender; India’s Situation “Alarming” by Saabira Chaudhuri, Live Mint, 19 October, 2009, http://blog.livemint.com/the-development-dossier/2009/10/1
9/global-hunger-index-hunger-linked-to-gender-india%E2%80%
99s-situation-%E2%80%9Calarming%E2%80%9D/#  

India 65th on Global Hunger Index for 2009, The Hindustan Times, 14 October, 2009,
http://www.hindustantimes.com/rssfeed/india/India-65th-on-
Global-Hunger-Index-for-2009/Article1-465414.aspx# 
 
International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), 2009,
http://www.ifpri.org/publication/2009-global-hunger-index  

 

Write Comments

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*

Video Archives

Archives

Im4Change.org हिंदी वेबसाइट का परिचय. Short Video on im4change.org...

Im4Change.org हिंदी वेबसाइट का परिचय. Short Video on im4change.org...

"Session 1: Scope of IDEA and AgriStack" in Exploring...

"Session 2: Farmer Centric Digitalisation in Agriculture" in Exploring...

"Session 3: Future of Digitalisation in Agriculture" in Exploring...

Objectives | About Us | Workshops | Disclaimer
share on Facebook
Twitter
RSS
Feedback
Read Later

Contact Form

Please enter security code
      Close