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Last grain in the bucket….?
The current food crisis has hit several millions in the world, mainly in developing countries with already weak economies. Currently the crisis is badly affecting 800 million people (over 70% women) that were already affected by chronic hunger. The price of vegetable oils is up 97 percent in the first three months of 2008. The price of wheat is up 87 percent, dairy products by 58 percent, rice by 46 percent. There is a recognised food crisis in at least 45 countries. It is ironic that out of 2.13 bn tonnes of food produced annual only 1.01bn is grown for feeding people. Developing countries could face an increase of 33% in aggregate food import bills this year if trends persist - this is too much too quick.
The crisis is already affecting millions, women in particular that cannot afford basic food like rice, maize and corn and are going hungry. Women cannot feed their families- they already spent three quarters of their income on food and have now the stark choice of eating less food or switching to less nutritious, cheaper food. As hunger rises so does civil unrest - in many countries protests have already been quashed and dozens of people have lost their lives in clashes with police. Hunger riots have taken place in at least 40 countries. Farmers are committing suicide. Efforts to meet the MDGs are being seriously undermined as maternal health and child mortality rates increase due to lack of food, families fail to send their children to school due to hunger and the increased need for child labour and government investment in essential services is redirected to emergency areas.
The crisis is a build up of several factors that came in to play to create the current situation. Some include; crop yield is not commensurate with population growth; rate of consumption has gone up particularly in terms of animal products like poultry in many rich countries. Decades of neglect in supporting sustainable local agriculture; agricultural subsidies and other distorting trade barriers in developed countries; the diversion of maize yields toward bio fuels; the high cost of petrol, fertilizers and seeds; climate change, desertification and decreasing water resources; a weak US dollar; commodities futures speculation, etc.”
There is a high range of variability in food consumption e.g. in countries like the US and Russia one tonne will support one individual, in poor countries, one tonne supports nearly six individuals. The average in the world is three persons per tonne. At present more than 65 countries are either producing or importing less than this food average.
The major trigger was the increase in energy price that has a downstream impact on all inputs. Agriculture in many countries is energy intensive. As a result of increases in) energy prices, industrialised countries diverted some of the grains for bio-fuels. United States in particular is diverting 30% of corn, maize production for ethanol. Above all, global warming and uncertain meteorological factors also affected the situation.
The high level conference by Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) on World Food Security: the Challenges of Climate Change and Bio-energy in Rome may address this issue. Among many other state delegations from member countries the meeting will be attended by the UN Secretary General, several Heads of State as well as World Bank and IMF representatives, where they will discuss ways to address the current global food crisis. This meeting can be an opportunity to address the structural problems contributing to the crisis such as under-investment in agriculture, unfair trade rules, lack of progress on the MDGs, lack of delivery on aid commitments and gender injustice. Further to minor initiatives nothing much is done or promised by the developed countries to address the problem. UN call to for immediate support to countries facing sever crisis to buy and produce their own food and prevent a starvation has not received the response the crisis requires UN also alerted that food prices are not going to go down in the next 10 years, ringing alarm bell to the world leaders. Some civil society groups like Global Call to Action against Poverty is organising people’s response on the food crisis and brining people’s voices, testimonies to these global leaders and forums. But we need more than just meetings and discussions. Concrete steps need to be taken immediately to avoid any mass scale hunger or starvation. At global level clear political decisions should be taken to stop using food products for bio-fuels, provide immediate support to countries facing crisis to buy food and control oil prices.
At national level all these governments must take immediate measures to legalise land and succession rights for women, provide agricultural and micro-finance input to lift (mainly women’s) subsistence farming, monitor food prices in a transparent way and support food production and storage before the crisis reaches a higher level. Take away the control of the private and market forces on fixing prices of food items. Land must be secured for food production as a percentage of the population and diverting corn for fuel production must be banned immediately.
It is also advised the crisis of the first decade of the 21st century should lead to a green revolution. This is a war against hunger where every state, has own degree of responsibility. We can't play politics with hunger; all governments, international institutions and political forces should work together. We need a global approach to agriculture and food security. If we miss this opportunity, we will have a very serious situation coming up very soon. Famine may not come but we will have famine of work, famine of income, breakdown of law and order and greater social unrest.
