Genesis of Report
The last 3 decades have ushered in considerable international humanitarian focus on reducing hunger for all people, regardless of nationality, ethnicity, age, income, and geographic location. Highlighting this global initiative have been 2 major commitments put forth by the UN member states, one in 1996 and the other in 2000. The former was launched in Rome by 182 governments participating in the World Food Summit when they committed “…to eradicate hunger in all countries, with an immediate view to reducing the number of undernourished people to half their present level no later than 2015.” To put this into perspective, in 1990, ∼991 million people around the world were considered to be undernourished, generally defined as being underweight for one’s age, too short for one’s age (stunted), dangerously thin for one’s height (wasted), and/or deficient in vitamins and minerals (micronutrient malnutrition). In 2000, as part of the UN’s Millennium Development Goal, the following was put forth as an international aim: “cutting by half the proportion of people who suffer from hunger by 2015.” Approximately 23% of the world’s population was considered to be hungry or (synonymously) undernourished in 1990. In a nutshell, the World Food Summit goal was to halve the number of malnourished people, whereas that of the Millennium Development Goals was to halve the proportion of people who are hungry.
With the end date of 2015 upon us, the UN’s most recent annual State of Food Insecurity in the World report takes stock of the progress made toward achieving these slightly different yet equally ambitious and fundamental goals related to greatly reducing world hunger. Key findings and messages from this report jointly prepared by the FAO, the International Fund for Agricultural Development, and the World Food Program are summarized here.
Overall Global Trends and Status toward Goals
Most recent rigorously obtained estimates suggest that nearly 795 million people in the world (about 1 in 9) continue to lack sufficient food to live active and healthy lives, and the vast majority of undernourished people (780 million) continue to live in developing regions of the world. The proportion of undernourished people has also decreased substantially, despite a growing global population. These trends are illustrated in Figure 1. Indeed, the latest estimates of the proportion of people who are undernourished suggest that developing regions as a whole have nearly reached the Millennium Development Goal hunger target, and the authors of this report state that “the target can be considered as having been achieved.” However, meeting the World Food Summit version of the target would have required a reduction in the number of undernourished people to 515 million—some 265 million fewer than the current estimate. As such, this target was not realized. Nonetheless, considering a 1.9 billion–person expansion in global population since 1990, the decreasing percentage of global hunger equates to millions of people having been rescued from a life of hunger over the past 25 y.
FIGURE 1.
The trajectory of undernourishment in developing regions: actual and projected progress toward the targets of the World Food Summit (WFS) and Millennium Development Goals (MDG). Data for 2014–2016 refer to provisional estimates. Source: FAO.
Challenging global economic environments, including volatile commodity prices, overall higher food and energy prices, and rising unemployment rates, are cited as factors hampering even more substantial progress in this regard. In addition, wide differences continue to exist among geographic and political regions in terms of progress toward improved food security. For instance, some regions (notably the Caucasus and Central Asia, East Asia, Latin America, and North Africa) made remarkably rapid progress, whereas headway was sluggish (and sometimes absent) in some regions of South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. Despite these disparities, a total of 29 countries reached the targets of both the World Food Summit and Millennium Development Goals. The report concludes that “overall progress notwithstanding, much work remains to be done to eradicate hunger and achieve food security across all its dimensions.”
Key messages and overall conclusions
In conclusion, the report outlines several key messages. These are delineated and summarized here.
Global trends: 795 million people continue to be undernourished globally; this represents a decrease of 167 million people over the last decade, and 216 million fewer than in 1990. The decline was substantially more pronounced in developing regions of the world.
Progress toward Millennium Development Goals: For the developing regions as a whole, the share of undernourished people in the total population decreased from 23% to 13%, with some regions making more substantial and/or rapid progress than others. A total of 72 developing countries out of 129 reached the Millennium Development Goal’s overall hunger target. Most of the countries reaching this goal enjoyed stable political conditions and economic growth, often accompanied by social protection policies targeted at vulnerable population groups. Similarly, the proportion of underweight children under 5 y of age declined. In some regions, including West Africa, Southeast Asia, and South America, overall undernutrition declined faster than the rate for child underweight. This suggests room for improvement in terms of diet quality, hygiene conditions, and access to clean water, particularly among the poorest of the poor.
Inclusive economic growth: Whereas economic growth was identified as a key predictor of success in reducing undernutrition, fiscal opportunities and growth have to be inclusive and provide opportunities for improving the livelihoods of the poor. Related to this is the importance of enhancing productivity and incomes of small-scale family farmers.
Importance of social protection systems: Intact, effective social protection systems appeared to be critical in fostering progress toward the UN’s international hunger goals in many countries. Social protection is thought to contribute to that end by promoting income security, access to nutrient-rich foods, health care, and enhanced education—especially when mitigating the impacts of natural and man-made shocks.
For More Information
A free online version of this report can be found at http://www.fao.org/3/a-i4646e/index.html. Key messages, regional overviews, and interactive maps illustrating progress by global region and year are available at http://www.fao.org/hunger/en/. The UN’s Millennium Development Goals are described in detail at http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/.