Food insecurity

A detailed survey conducted by the government in conjunction with Unicef has made the disturbing, though not entirely unexpected, revelation that only 28 per cent of households in Sindh are “food secure”. The National Nutrition Survey showed an alarming level of malnutrition throughout the country, but particularly among women and children in Sindh. About the only positive outcome the study has shown is an improvement in iodine intake; this, however, is more than offset by deterioration in levels of other nutrients, including vitamin A and vitamin D. Worrisome as this is, there have been warning signs. Last year, the International Food Policy Research Institute ranked Pakistan nineteenth on the Global Hunger Index, declaring it as a state that faced “a serious hunger threat”. Over the years, various UN agencies have issued similar warnings but policymakers have not heeded. In 2001, a survey placed Pakistan among the top 20 countries in the world with chronic undernutrition. Over the past decade, others in the list improved their ranking but Pakistan’s stayed the same.

Policymakers need to realise that hunger is not merely a health problem but a complex socioeconomic issue that requires well-designed interventions. The fact that Pakistan has made no gains in this area since the 2001 survey — despite having the capacity to do so — points to criminal apathy on the part of policymakers. Of course, this is not to say, that hunger and malnutrition can be overcome easily. The floods of the last two years have exacerbated the situation, leading to massive increases in food prices. According to the Planning Commission’s calculations, the monthly cost of the minimum caloric intake that an average Pakistani should be consuming has gone up by 74 per cent, from Rs960 in 2007-2008 to Rs1,670 in June 2011. A World Food Programme study estimates that an additional 18 million people became undernourished in 2010 because of these price increases, swelling the undernourished population from a baseline of 77.6 million people in 2005-2006 to 95.7 million people. What is needed is a comprehensive policy to increase agricultural production by better managing our resources — particularly water, reducing wastage, improving dietary practices and ensuring more equitable food distribution.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 16^th, 2012.