المنتدى العالمي المعني بالأمن الغذائي والتغذية

Biodiversity is contributing in achieving food security and improved nutrition?

The overuse of biodiversity compromise food security and nutrition?

According to the last Human Development Report (UNDP 2016), 49.8% of all the children below the age of five are suffering from chronic malnutrition in Guatemala. To the present day, child malnutrition remains an issue of serious concern in the country, although this does not mean that the problem is being addressed properly by government authorities.

Even though there is no much information regarding the link between biodiversity and food security and nutrition in Guatemala, there are two possible scenarios. One scenario is that, if Guatemalan rural people would not have access to some forest products (food plants and bush meat) that enables to supplement their basic corn and beans diet, the percentage of malnourished children in the country would be even worse.  The second scenario is very related to the first one, because the chronic malnutrition epidemic in Guatemala might be being exacerbated by deforestation and land use change. According to the last forest cover analysis, Guatemala has an annual gross loss of 132,137 hectares of forest, which means that an area of 150,000 square meters of forest is lost every hour.