A World Free of Hunger: Is It Achievable?

By N. GUNASEKARAN

A declaration by the United Nations has sharply termed hunger as the global public health problem. A UN report,”The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World-2022” warned that the world was moving backward from the declared goal of ending hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition by 2030. The report presented a lot of evidence that an increasing number of people were continuously affected by severe hunger. In 2021, more than 828 million people were seriously affected by hunger, which was 46 million people more than in 2020 and 150 million more than 2019.

Hunger is the most dreadful problem for both the developed and the less developed countries in Asia. A majority of the Asian population, which has crossed 4.5 billion people, are suffering from severe hunger. In 2021, 396 million people in the Asia-Pacific were undernourished and more than 1.05 billion people in Asia and the Pacific suffered food insecurity. During the pandemic years, 58 million more people in Asia were deprived of food and went hungry. Obviously, the need for food is increasing as the population is growing in Asia.

Some 425 million people in Asia were suffering from the problem of being underweight. In 2021, among the worldwide 768 million nutrient deficient individuals, around 9% were from Asian countries. In the Asian continent, South Asia and Southeast Asian countries were most affected by hunger. In South Asia 15.7% of its total population were suffering from severe hunger and South Asia had approximately 281.4 million undernourished people. Of the total population of the Southeast Asian countries, 9.8% or 27.8 million were malnourished.

In the case of children in Asia, the situation is heartbreaking and pathetic. More than 170 million children in poor countries are underweight, mainly due to lack of food. More than half of all Asian children are malnourished and undersized due to the deprivation of healthy food and many children die before the age of five.

Stunting, one of the most significant barriers to child development, is caused by the biological mechanism when the kids can't develop to their full potential. It affects the physical and mental well-being of children. The main causes of this problem was frequent infections and persistent malnutrition within the first two years of life of a child. Among the worldwide 150.8 million stunted children, Asia had 83.6 million, that is, 55%, of the world’s stunted children.

Neoliberal (free market) policies, implemented by the governments across Asia, created numerous opportunities for the big monopolies and multinational corporations to loot the agricultural resources of the poor countries. Now, the food security of billions of downtrodden and lower and middle income groups in Asian countries is gravely threatened.

The global food system is collapsing thanks to the intrusion of profit-oriented big corporations in agriculture, especially in Asia. The consequence of this neoliberal regime was that the pushing of food prices to record high levels, shortages of food items, expanding hunger, climate-related disasters and a breakdown of supply chains. Additionally, the Russia-Ukraine War that caused rising oil and gas prices and consequent rising of food prices, and the continuing fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic are impacting on the food crisis and aggravate the problem of hunger.The widespread hunger is closely connected with the joblessness of millions of people, drastic reduction of incomes of the people and downturn in nations’ economies which have not recovered from severe recession.

The living standards of the poor in Asia were seriously hit due to high Inflation prevailing in Asian countries.The purchasing power of the poor in Asia was very much declining while the costs of food and food grains were increasing, affecting not only the downtrodden poor, but also the lower and middle classes. The cost of food has been higher in Asia than all other parts of the world.

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) said: “Inflation rose to higher levels in most Asian economies in the second quarter (Q2) or Q3 of 2022, compared with 2021 and 2020, especially in Azerbaijan, Laos, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.” With the highest inflation rates in Asia, many low-income earners in Asian countries were struggling to afford basic necessities including food. The poor and disadvantaged people were most severely hurt, and they were not able to afford an adequate quantity of nutrient-rich food.

Added to the woes of the starving people of Asia, the Ukraine’s war is causing devastating impact on peoples’ lives. The conflict in Ukraine resulted in severe shortages of wheat, fuel, and fertilizer with several low-income nations struggling to provide essential necessities for their people.

In Asian nations, the inequality had risen at enormous levels in the neoliberal era.Even the huge sums of stimulus packages announced by the governments during the pandemic, were pocketed by the rich billionaires.Such inequality-driven, corporate-oriented neoliberal policies would not ensure food security for the people. To end hunger in Asia, the governments have to ensure the food security with enough food for the poor and guaranteeing the sufficient purchasing power for the people to have access to adequate food. Accordingly, the governments have to reverse the current neoliberal approach and adopt people-oriented policies.

N. Gunasekaran is a political activist and writer based in Chennai, India.

From The Progressive Populist, April 15, 2023

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