A family in Badin, Pakistan eating food. PHOTO: AFP
NEW YORK: According to a new ranking released by Oxfam, Pakistan ranked 97th in a list of 125 countries with regard to availability, quality and affordability of food and dietary health.
The listing means Pakistan is one of the countries with the most unhealthy and scarce food.
Oxfam is an international relief and development organization that looks for practical and innovative ways to raise people out of poverty and blossom.
The index looked at the percentage of underweight children, food diversity and access to clean water, as well as negative health outcomes such as obesity and diabetes.
India got the same rank as Pakistan. African nations, along with Laos (112), Bangladesh (102), were predominant in the bottom 30 countries. Chad came in last on the list, behind Ethiopia and Angola, in the food index.
Burundi (119), Yemen (121), Madagascar (122) and India have the worst rates of nutrition and the most underweight children, according to Oxfam.
The Netherlands nudged past France and Switzerland as the country with the most nutritious, plentiful and healthy food, while the United States and Japan failed to make it into the top 20.
"The Netherlands have created a good market that enables people to get enough to eat. Prices are relatively low and stable and the type of food people are eating is balanced," Deborah Hardoon, a senior researcher at Oxfam who compiled the results, said in an interview.
"They've got the fundamentals right and in a way that is better than most other countries all over the world."
European countries dominated the top of the ranking but Australia squeezed into the top 12, tying with Ireland, Italy, Portugal and Luxembourg at No. 8.
The United Kingdom failed to make the top 10, tying for the 13th spot, because of the volatility of its food prices compared to other goods, which Oxfam said is on a level with Peru (51), Malta (33) and Kyrgyzstan (65).
Although the United States has the most affordable and good quality food, high levels of obesity and diabetes pushed the nation into 21st place in the ranking, tying with Japan, which scored poorly on the relative price of food compared to other goods.
The Netherlands got top marks for its low food prices and diabetes levels, while Chad had the worst score for the cost of food in the country and the number of underweight children - 34 percent. The only countries where food is more expensive are Guinea and the Gambia, which were both at the lower end of the ranking.
People going hungry
Oxfam said the latest figures show 840 million people go hungry every day, despite there being enough food for the hungry. It called for changes in the way food is produced and distributed around the world.
The causes of hunger, it added, include a lack of investment in infrastructure in developing nations and in small-scale agriculture, security, prohibitive trading agreements, biofuel targets that divert crops from food to fuel and the impact of climate change.
Research suggests that climate change could raise the number of people at risk of hunger by 20 to 50 percent by 2050, according to the group.
"This index quite clearly indicates that despite the fact of there being enough food in the world we are still not able to feed everybody in all the countries around the world," said Hardoon.
"If we had a more equal distribution of wealth and resources, and particularly food, this wouldn't be a problem," she added.
Oxfam compiled the data between October and December 2013 using the latest information from the World Health Organisation, the Food and Agriculture Foundation, the International Labour Organisation and other international organisations.
The index provides a snapshot based on the relative differences in various countries based on the number of factors. But Hardoon said it is not the comprehensive picture of any one nation.
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@unbelievable:
so other than N.Korea, Pakistan is the ONLY other country where people have gotten smaller? despite the fact that countries like india,nepal and bangladesh have much more rampant and prevalant malnutrition, like the following figure suggests:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:ChildrenunderheightforageUNHDR_2007-2008.PNG
please check your sources of information, they might not be credible :P
If India and Pakistan spend less on their militaries and reduce corruption, i think no one in these countries will go hungry. Ever...
So both nations do not have sufficient food to eat but ever ready to fight each other. Oh we both are nuclear powers too.
@Khurram Awan: Must you guys make divisive statements? Are you saying "We (superior type Punjabis) are a shade less poor than others in Pakistan"? This kind of thinking has divided the Indian Muslims from Pakistan and Kashmir, led to the splintering away of East Pakistan from West Pakistan and will inevitably lead to further splintering of the rump Pakistan unless folks like you start to think less along narrow provincial lines, ethnicities, your castes and your sects.
@Priyank, There was no TNT it was brain of white race to control the area next 100 years.
Two Nation Theory is Still Valid Because "India has the worst rates of nutrition and the most underweight children, according to Oxfam" PAKISTAN WON
I have never been to India, but recently visited Pakistan. From my personal experience I think anyone who isn't wealthy, or does not have farm land is very unfortunate in Pakistan. The price of food is astonishing. Even for the middle class it must be a significant expenditure, i hate to think how working class people make do. Evidently they must go without.
I dream of a Pakistan where everyone has 3 meals a day and a roof over thier head. I'm not concerned about millionaires, billionaires, nuclear bombs or cricket. My father left Pakistan 50 years ago as a homeless teenage refugee who's family was in abject poverty. It saddens me that even today young men are leaving to labour outside Pakistan to provide for thier families in a manner in which they cannot within Pakistan.
This should be the number1 priority in Pakistan.
Another conspiracy to defy Two Nation Theory by putting both India and Pakistan at same level and thus trying to indicate that both nations are one. We reject it.
@Priyank
Oh, You realized now!!!! Two nation theory was thrown into Bay of bengal during 1971 when the BD was created
exactly, we should not care about the reports, but infect these reports does matter. we can evaluate and observe hunger, food security within our community easily which is more authentic than the reports. if you go back to the southern part of Punjab, you will see the reality how much people are hunger and how they are living their life. flood affected people are also living in misery. forget the reports, but don't forget the people, its a time we all have to play our role we need to work from grass root level. need should be assesses then actions should be taken.
If only we stop exporting food items for profit and keep local prices low it can improve the life of the poorest people
We only need issues like Kashmir and few corrupt politicians to stay where we are.
@Khurram Awan: In other words, let's try to whitewash the message that is loud and clear: that India and Pakistan are equally deficient in food availability and nutrition as countries. You want to break it down province by province in order to play with numbers to somehow come out better. What makes you believe that Indian Punjab will not come out better than our Punjab and smash your theory right off the bat??? Let's hope a time comes when our people will be blessed with ample food and nutrition and break the shackles of exploitation and malnutrition.
This article must be some Pakistani conspiracy for Indians who live under the delusion that they are some European state, with no problems of poverty as the blind Indian trolls on ET site like to denude and delude.
It is simple we are the same people who lives as one country for centuries. Even our fathers and grandfathers were all Indians whether they were born in Lahore, Peshawar, Delhi, or Calcutta. The most evident fact is countries which are modern and secular are at the top and countries with all biases and hatred without a modern system are languishing. We need new schools and new thinking if we want to uplift the masses.
don't care about what these americans think . it is all politics.
There are as many indices being released as there are days in a year. Many with shoddy data gathering and almost nil analysis . And some like this organization which scouts controversies and spends most of what it is gifted in sheer administrative costs. Do we need to know what we are from these reports ?
Well statistics on Pakistan must have a breakdown based on Province and region to region basis. This is because Upper Punjab and many regions of KPK have a different situation than the rest of Pakistan as most of house holds in Villages have atleast one livestock to produce milk and millions of families grow their own food and they will perform much better compared to others.
Two nation theory proved wrong once again. We both suck, equally.