Food Security
Introduction
Food security arises when all persons have access to sufficient nutritious and safe food to meet their wants for a healthy life and in a sustainable way. Globally, Food security is a challenge as by 2050, the world must have adequate food to feed a population of around nine billion people and the future state is that there will be a 60% increase in global food demand. The United Nations under its Sustainable Development Goals 2030, highlighted the following as the second tenant to achieve development globally; sustainable agriculture, food security and the end to hunger. Food security has faced challenges over time and across both in consumption and in production.
To achieve food security, several issues need to be addressed ranging from ageing demographics and gender parity concerning skills growth and development and mitigating global warming. The Agriculture sector has to be more innovative and productive by adopting innovative ways of farming, efficient and effective business models as well as venturing into public-private partnership as a way of fighting food insecurity. The sector should further develop sustainable ways to address water usage, greenhouse gas emissions ad waste management. Some of the risks posed by food insecurity are; conflict among the society of countries as the scramble for food and survival, hunger and malnutrition.
Every person needs food, but it is challenging to deliver sufficient food to the whole population in a nation or globally and this indicates that food security is a concern and priority for every nation whether developed or developing. This is a global challenge as it’s not all about feeding the population and food, it covers also the aspect of society and the economy.
Causes of Food insecurity
Population Growth
There has been a surge in population growth over the past decades and this doesn’t seem to stop soon. Population growth varies across different countries and regions. In Africa for example, the population is estimated to double by 2050 from one to two billion people. Urbanisation is increasing in the developing countries especially in Asia and Africa with a total of 2.5 billion people expected to become urban residents.
Climate Change
There has been a climatic change of the last few decades, occasioned by high temperatures. 40% of the globe’s land is either arid or semi-arid. With rising temperatures, most of the land will turn into desert and as a result, the amount of food produced to feed the population today will manage to feed part of the population in 2050.
Water Scarcity
Water Scarcity is also a global concern whereby 28% of agriculture depends on water-stressed areas. 1,500 litres is used to yield a kilo of wheat and around 16,000 litres of water are used to yield a kilo of beef. This shows that in 2050, double of this will be needed to produce sufficient food for the ever-increasing population.
Changing Tastes
With the increasing population growth, technological advancement, social interaction among different cultures, there has been dietary changes too. Due to all these changes, people have become better off and they have started to make changes on what they eat especially on processed foods, dairy and meat. But for this to be sustainable, more pastures should be produced.
Troubled Farmers
Fewer people are choosing farming as an occupation which is evidenced by having less than 2% of people in developed countries producing food or farm animals for food. This is so as the people witness a rise in food prices, soil degradation due to over-farming and use of chemicals and continuous loss of land due to sprawl.
Why Food Insecurity is Complex to Tackle
In India, Agriculture contributes 47% of its labour force and 18% of its economic output. It is the second-largest producer of vegetables and fruits globally yet 194 million people in India are under-malnourished. This indicates the largest population in the world who suffer from hunger in any single country. 15.2% of the population are malnourished with a third of globally malnourished children reside in India and thus not able to live a normal life.
To address the issue of food security and malnourished population in a country like India, improvement in the productivity in the agriculture sector especially in subsistence farming and smallholder farms is required. There is a high prevalence of poverty and hunger among rural and farming communities.
Agriculture should be sustainable, as the sector covers 70% of freshwater withdrawals and 30% of greenhouse emissions and this should lead to focus on the use of water and energy in food production. Waste management is another problem, with one-third of food consumed, $ 750 billion is lost.
Recommendation and Conclusion
In 2007 and early 2008, global food prices rose to lead to riots and social unrest in both developed and developing countries from Mozambique to Mexico, from Brazil to Bangladesh. This led to the creation of New Vision for Agriculture aimed to achieve improvement in food security by use of public-private partnership, economic opportunities and environmental sustainability till 2050.
The New Vision for Agriculture, countries and other agencies should mobilize funds which should be used to support smallholder farmers and subsistence farming to minimise the gap of food security.
There should be an increase of exchange of knowledge and facilitating partnership among regional and national levels, which can be achieved by bringing together, private sector, governments, farmers and civil society to foster food production and understand the needs of each region of population.
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