The End of Hunger in the 21st Century: Myth or Reality? Dr. Liz Young Staffordshire University

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The End of Hunger in the 21st Century Myth or
Reality?Dr. Liz YoungStaffordshire University
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Overview

• Contemporary geography of world hunger
• Estimates for the 21st century
• Ways Forward strategies and debates
• Issues for the 21st century

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• Almost 800 million people in the developing
  world do not have enough to eat. Another 34
  million people in the industrialised countries
  and countries in transition also suffer from
  chronic food insecurity
• (FAO, 2000)
• Both developed and developing nations are
  paying a high price for malnutrition. The World
  Bank estimates that hunger cost India between 3
  and 9 of its GDP in 1996. And obesity cost the
  United States 12 of its national health care
  budget in the late 1990s, 118 billion, more
  than double the 47 billion attributed to
  smoking
• (Halweil, 2000)

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Contemporary Hunger

• Chronic Hunger contemporary patterns
• 791 million people in developing world
• 34 million in transitional economies
• Total 825 million
• New statistic measures depth of hunger and
  reflects very different character of hunger
  within these broad categories( range from 150-450
  kilo-calorie deficits per day)

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Contemporary Hunger continued

• New maps now available which measure degree of
  food deprivation where
• 1 is low prevalence and low depth and
• 5 is high prevalence and high depth
• 23 countries in SSA and Afghanistan, Bangladesh,
  Haiti, Mongolia and North Korea all receive 5 in
  the latest FAO report http//www.fao.org/FOCUS/E/S
  OF100/sofi008-e.htm

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Table 1 Geography of Contemporary Hunger

• Sub-Saharan Africa
• N East/N Africa
• Latin America/Caribbean
• China
• India
• TOTAL
• Transitional economies
• TOTAL

180 33 53 164 204 791 34 825
Transitional economies of former Soviet Union
(now the Commonwealth of Independent States).
Russia and the Asian and Caucasian Republics have
seen the re-emergence of malnutrition as public
social provisioning has collapsed in post-1991
circumstances.
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Table 2 Geography of Contemporary Hunger of
total population

• Sub-Saharan Africa
• N East/N Africa
• Latin America/Caribbean
• China/India
• Other Asia
• AVERAGE

34 10 11 16 19 18

• Source Food and Agricultural Organisation (2000)
  The State of Food Insecurity
• http//www.fao.org/NEWS/FACTFILE/FF9702-E.HTM

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Summary

• China and India still greatest numbers but
  experiencing declines
• SSA greatest incidence and greatest depth of
  hunger (recent statistic used to reflect extent
  of calorie deficit)
• 1970 920 million
• 2000 792 million
• Progress uneven

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Estimates for the 21st century

• Estimated 580 million by 2015
• 400 million was target for 2015 of World Food
  Summit, 1996
• Progress, but not enough

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Estimates for the 21st century continued

• Success Stories
• Ghana and Nigeria
• 1979 - 1996 30 decline
• in malnutrition

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Estimates for the 21st century continued

• Thailand
• State intervention to target vulnerable groups
• 1988 32.6 in poverty
• 1996 11.4

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Estimates for the 21st century continued

• Caution!
• Predictions are notoriously difficult and human
  history is full of unexpected surprises.
  (emergence of malnutrition in former Soviet Union
  and famines in 1930s, 1950s)

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Ways Forward food security in the 21st century

• Past experience suggests that chronic hunger
  could be conquered within this century (FAO,
  16th October 2000 World Food Day a millennium
  free from hunger)

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Ways Forward food security in the 21st century
continued

• The conventional way
• Globalisation, free markets and corporate control
• Britain will this year export 111 million litres
  of milk and 47 million kilograms of butter, while
  simultaneously importing 173 million litres of
  milk and 49 million kilograms of butter
  (Norberg-Hodge, 1999 p209)

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Ways Forward food security in the 21st century
continued

• Decline of local provisioning

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Ways Forward food security in the 21st century
continued

• Technologically based agricultural
  industrialisation
• Mechanisation
• Chemical farming
• Food manufacturing
• Diffusion of technologically agricultural
  production
• Green Revolution of 1970s
• Genetically modified crops

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Ways Forward food security in the 21st century
continued

• Intensive production systems
• High energy inputs
• Increases in irrigated land
• Landless production systems

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Ways Forward food security in 21st century
continued

• Export orientated systems
• Developing countries will become increasingly
  dependent on imports of cereals. Their net cereal
  imports are expected to rise from 107 million
  tonnes in 1995/97 to 270 million tonnes in2030
  (see review athttp//www.fao.org/NEWS/2000/000704
  -e.htm)

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The case against more of the same

• Unsustainable nature of current system
• http//www.irn.org/programs/threeg/
• Vulnerability to collapse
• http//www.grain.org/publications/set00/set003.htm
  
• Environmental impacts
• http//news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/static/events/rei
  th 2000/lecture5.stm
• http//www.worldwatch.org/chairman/issue/000502.ht
  ml
• http//www.cgiar.org/ifpri/pressre/052500.htm
• Mounting evidence of social impacts
• http//www.worldwatch.org/alerts/000901.html
• http//news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/static/events/rei
  th 2000/lecture5.stm

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• Meanwhile, mono-culture farming based on
  industrial techniques, vast transport systems and
  elaborate commercial and financial instruments,
  are being rapidly exported to the rest of the
  world. The complexity and self-renewal of those
  systems are in danger, as is biological diversity
  and the renewal of water and air cycles necessary
  to human life (Friedman, 2000 p150)

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Conclusion Revisiting food security

• food security, at the individual, household,
  national, regional and global levels . . is
  achieved when all people, at all times have
  physical and economic access to sufficient, safe
  and nutritious food to meet their dietary needs
  and food preferences for an active and healthy
  life
• (World Food Summit, 1996)

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Conclusion Revisiting food security continued

• Sufficient remains an important objective
• Safe food globally
• http//notmilk.com/
• nutritious food globally (the face of
  malnutrition in the 21st c?)
• http//www.worldwatch.org/alerts/000304.htm
• choice for consumers
• http//www.oneworld.org/ni/issue325/bite.htm

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Conclusion Revisiting food security continued

• sustainability in both regions
• http//www.christian-aid.org.uk/news/latest/brief1
  5500.htm
• http//www.guardianunlimited.co.uk/Archive/Articke
  /0,4273,4012574,00.html
• http//www.faoorg/NEWS/FACTFILE/FF9810-E.HTM
  (urban populations)

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Conclusion continued

• Halting the decline of the planets life-support
  systems may be the most difficult challenge
  humanity has ever faced (Lash quoted in IFPRI,
  2000 p1)

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THE END