Population Of Chronic Hunger Declines

 
Number of people suffering chronic
hunger is down 26 million from 2012, but
more needs to be done, UN says .
Rome, Italy - Some 842 million people
suffer from chronic hunger around the
world, but as high as this number
seems, it should still be considered
progress.
The number of people suffering from
hunger is down
from 868 million last year ,
according to the State of Food Insecurity
in the World ( SOFI 2013 )
report , published Tuesday by the three
Rome -based UN food agencies .
Among the reasons behind this progress
are economic growth in developing
countries - which is improving incomes
and access to food - a pick- up in
agricultural productivity, and increased
public and private investment in
agriculture .
Remittances from migrants are also
playing a role in reducing
poverty , according to the UN report.
The vast majority of hungry people live in
developing regions , while 15. 7 million live
in developed countries . But despite the
progress detected worldwide, strong
inequalities in hunger reduction remain.
Sub- Saharan Africa has made only modest
progress in recent years , and remains the
region with the highest prevalence of
undernourishment, with one in four
people - 24.8 percent - estimated to be
hungry.
No progress is observed in Western
Asia, while Southern Asia and Northern
Africa showed "slow progress ". More
substantial reductions in both the number
of hungry and prevalence of
undernourishment have occurred in most
countries of East Asia, Southeast Asia , and
in Latin America .
Since 1990- 92, the total number of
undernourished in developing countries
has fallen by 17 percent from 995 .5
million to 826 . 6 million .
The ambitious target set at the 1996
World Food Summit ( WFS ) to halve the
number of hungry people by 2015 remains
out of reach at the global level , even
though 22 countries had already met it by
the end of 2012 .
The heads of the Food and Agriculture
Organisation (FAO ) , the International
Fund for Agricultural
Development ( IFAD) and the World Food
Programme ( WFP ) called for nutrition -
sensitive interventions in agriculture and
food systems as a whole , as well as in
public health and education, especially for
women.
Last year ' s UN report received a detailed
critique by a group of hunger researchers ,
led by author Frances Moore Lappe.
The publication offered specific
recommendations mainly in relation to
the presentation of hunger estimates and
on the report 's methodology .
Researchers found that estimates
represent the low end of the scale
because they are based on food
availability and the caloric requirements
required only leading a "sedentary
lifestyle". A less restrictive FAO threshold
leads to an estimate of 1 .33 billion hungry
in the world , rather than SOFI 2012's 868
million , according to the group .
Targeted policies and social programmes
are needed to achieve the goal of
eradicating hunger worldwide.
-Pietro Gennari, FAO Statistics Division
director
Another factor of concern was the focus
on global hunger , which masks wide
regional variation . Progress in China and
Vietnam alone account for more than 90
percent of the estimated reductions in
the number of hungry people in the
world. National success stories , such as in
Ghana and Brazil, "are lost in the global
estimates, as are countries and regions in
crisis".
"This year 's report introduces important
innovations. We go beyond the traditional
FAO prevalence of undernourishment
indicator to measure the various
dimensions of food insecurity , in particular
the nutritional outcomes of food
insecurity ," said Pietro Gennari, director of
the Statistics Division at the FAO .
"These can be measured by different
indicators . In most cases , these indicators
are consistent with the trends of
prevalence of undernourishment, but this
is not always the case , and we have
studied specific countries to understand
why we have these divergences and the
policy measures that can address them . "
The report underlines that economic
growth is key for progress in hunger
reduction. "But that is not enough;
targeted policies and social programmes
are needed to achieve the goal of
eradicating hunger worldwide," Gennari
said.
Some contest this emphasis on economic
growth.
"The report offers some useful
elements, like some of the new index, and
more systematic information on food
insecurity ," Antonio Onorati from the
International Planning Committee for
Food Sovereignty told IPS . "But when it
comes to solutions, it proposes old and
ineffective recipes .
"Like the idea that 600 million small
producers who are food insecure simply
need to increase their productivity in
order to put their surplus into the market .
As if the local market was functional to
small- scale agriculture and to food
security. It is not so ."
According to Onorati , local markets are
only a reproduction of the global
market, "that same market that generates
crisis and even death of small farms , and
which is finally a key component of food
insecurity ".
"We would expect a deeper analysis of
the role of local markets ," he said.
Findings of SOFI 2013 will be discussed by
governments , civil society and private
sector at the October 7 - 11 meeting of
the Committee on World Food
Security in Rome .
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