Hunger: a structural problem

The FAO and World Food Programme (WFP) recently released the annual report “The State of Food Insecurity in the World”. The new estimate of the number of people who will suffer chronic hunger this year is 925 million — 98 million down from 1.023 billion in 2009. However, the fact that a child dies every six seconds because of undernourishment related problems is still unacceptable by any standard.

The current global hunger problem puts at serious risk the accomplishment not only of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), but also of the most basic needs for human survival.

The report illustrates in numbers an alarming situation that has existed in decades. First, the regionalization of hunger: developing countries account for 98 percent of the world’s undernourished people (ironically the majority of them actually live in rural areas). Second, it also shreds light on the vulnerability of countries that suffer of protracted crisis; roughly 20 percent of the world’s undernourished people (or more than a third of the global total if China and India are excluded) live in countries in protracted crisis.

These trails add to the fact that nearly a billion people remain hungry even after the recent food and financial crises passed by and indicates a deeper structural problem that gravely threatens the ability to achieve internationally agreed goals on hunger reduction.

Up to this moment, food security and agricultural production policies were designed following a neo liberal approach. Food price speculation in the global market has become more important than the human right to food and nutrition. This model has increased peoples’ dependence on agricultural imports and food aid, driven millions of farmers to abandon their traditional agricultural practices – promoting the rural exodus and increasing poverty as food becomes unaffordable.

In order to tackle the root causes of hunger, we need a new food system that respects political, social, cultural, and environmental rights as well as the right of peoples to self-determination. The concept of food sovereignty– defined by Via Campesina as the right of all peoples to define their agricultural and food policies, without unfair practices by third-party countries – needs to be integrated in international organizations and national policy making.

Food sovereignty is not against trade in food products; on the contrary, it is about seeking a fair trade that puts people first. This was precisely the point raised by the Brazilian foreign minister, Celso Amorim, at a reception lunch hosted by the UN Secretary General during the UN MDG Summit in September 2010. After US President Barack Obama proposed a toast saying “There is no reason to believe that the African continent cannot become a net exporter of foodstuffs”, the Brazilian chancellor stood up unannounced and said out loud “With all due respect, Mr. President, what would really help Africa to export is if you eliminate agricultural subsidies here in the US. It is a decision that does not require consensus, that a single country can take and that would benefit everyone."

If we do not tackle the hunger problem as a structural problem that needs to be approached from the food sovereignty and human rights perspective we will never be able to achieve the MDGs nor human dignity.  

Read the FAO report here: http://www.fao.org/publications/sofi/en/