According to United Nations’ Committee on World Food Security "Food security 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. According to FAO (The state of food security and nutrition in the world 2021 -doi:10.4060/cb5409en. ISBN 978-92-5-134634-1 nearly 12 percent of the global population was severely food insecure in 2020, representing 928 million people – 148 million more than in 2019. Increase in Food Insecurity could be attributed mainly to shortage of food and high food prices.
Shortage of food to meet the dietary needs and food preferences is closely related to production, and distribution. Food production is determined by many factors. Among these are land use; use of high yielding seeds/planting material, effective of soil and water management, control of pests and diseases, and harvesting at correct times. Distribution in food that was produced is determined by transport of food from the farm and marketing. Food distribution involves storage, processing, transport, packaging, and marketing of food. Food-chain infrastructure and storage technologies on farms can affect the amount of food wasted in the distribution process. Poor transport infrastructure can increase the price of supplying water and fertilizer as well as the price of moving food to national and global markets. Ineffective Livestock management also causes food shortage. In this regard rearing of high yielding breeds, availability of animal feeds are important. In all these activities inequalities among food producers/farmers influence food security to a great extent.
Food Security can be broadly categorized to National Food Security and House –hold Food Security.
National Food Security
National Food insecurity (NFS) is attributed to inadequate food production at national level and high prices consumers have to pay
In general, National Food Security depends on level of food production in a country and is affected by many factors common to the country. Among these are wild animals such as elephants, monkeys destroying crops, disease such as Chronic Kidney Disease affecting thousands of farmers in a number of countries , inadequate irrigation water supply due to droughts, lack of reasonable transport facilities, high prices of seeds, fertilizers and other inputs, ineffective marketing, lowered land productivity . All these issue can be addressed satisfactorily if the relevant authorities take cognizance of these issues in their endeavors to increase national food security.
Nations do not have to have the natural resources required to produce crops in order to achieve food security, as seen in the examples of Singapore where land and water necessary for food production are limited but Food Security is at 73.1 (100 is the most favorable) .According to FAO In 2019, the high cost of healthy diets together with persistent high levels of income inequality put healthy diets out of reach for around 3 billion people, especially the poor, in every region of the world. Ref. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. 2021. p. 5. doi:10.4060/cb5409en. ISBN 978-92-5-134634-1
One of the important contributory factors for the decline in the productivity of land resulting in lowered Food Security is Land Degradation. Soil erosion, soil compaction, and nutrition depletion, cause productivity of land to decline, making crop production less profitable. (See the publication “Land Degradation- an overview by Stanley Weerarartna, published by Springer- eBook ISBN 978-3-031-12138-8 Print ISBN978-3-031-12137-1
As indicated above several factors play important roles in food production. Efforts to strengthen the national food security require an integrated approach that combines crop improvement alongside sustainable land and water management, efficient irrigation, application of appropriate fertilizers and other inputs, effective marketing etc. To achieve NFS, the inequalities that cause NFS to be low need to be identified and appropriate straggles implemented. For example in countries/regions where NFS is at a low level due to lack of adequate irrigation water, water supply need to be improved by rain water harvesting, construction of water reservoirs etc, Such strategies are possible only in those countries which are financially sound.
House- hold Food Security
House-hold Food Security is closely related to the economy which has deteriorated during the last few years mainly due to drop-in crop production and several other factors. Prices of most food items have been on a steady rise since the last quarter of 2021 in many countries, and reached a record high in August 2022, with the year-on-year food inflation rate at nearly 94 percent, further limiting the purchasing power of households. ... Small scale farmers are the food producers in many countries. They are characterized by shortage of land, and capital.. Some pawn their gold jewelry to raise money to buy seeds, fertilizers and other inputs.
Poverty reduction is an integral part of house hold food security. Without FS, poverty becomes a vicious cycle. As a result of poverty, access of people to adequate, good quality food that is required to be healthy is denied. Malnutrition caused by low FS, has serious consequences on health of people. The lack of food security is thus both a cause and an effect of poverty. In a region that is home to more than half the world population, building food security—and sustaining it—is imperative for people’s welfare and the economic growth that drives it. According to FAO, the number of undernourished people has increased from 526 million in 1995–1997to 567 million in 2006–2008.
Improving agricultural productivity is essential for ensuring long-term food security and promoting poverty reduction in households. Adequate food supply is a fundamental prerequisite for hose-hold food security, especially as the global population is projected to reach 9 billion by2050. Improving farm productivity through better technology and efficiency can help increase food production at national as well as household level. Historically, agricultural productivity has played an important role in poverty reduction. As poverty in Asia remains a predominantly rural phenomenon, improving agricultural productivity will have an increasingly large impact on economic development and poverty reduction.
Implementing pogrammes to reduce inequality among households in a country or region is important to achieve a reasonable level of food security. Inequality in health among people result in wide differences in the capacity to produce food and hence Food Security. For example in Sri Lanka a chronic kidney disease, affecting farmers and their house-holds in some parts of the country result in lowered Food Security. In such situations the relevant authorities need to implement relevant programmes to reduce the occurrence of the disease so that the level of Food Security among those house-holds can be increased. In fact, reverse osmosis plants have been installed in affected areas which has reduced level of differences in Food Security level among the households.
Most food producers in Asian countries live in villages. Hence, rural development can contribute substantially to poverty reduction and achieving a higher level of food security. As a majority of the region’s poor live in rural areas, national policy makers are facing a dilemma when choosing policies to stabilize food prices. Some countries to maintain farm incomes at high levels do not implement practices to reduce high food prices. But, such policies tend to affect the poor non- faming households causing them to have a low food security. High food prices can also reduce the farmer’s own purchasing power, forcing them to spend a large sum of money on seeds, fertilizers, and other inputs thus further reducing food production and thereby reducing Food Security. Rural economic growth and stable food prices, therefore, are essential in any strategy to increase Food Security.
An integrated approach is necessary to achieve food security. The factors, which cause food insecurity among different communities in the country need to be examined and action taken accordingly.
Dr. Stanley Weeraratna
Former Professor of Agronomy, Ruhuna University, Sri Lanka
Dr. Stanley Weeraratna