The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2023 (SOFI 2023) report was released by the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) in July 2023. This report provides an update on global progress towards Sustainable Development Goal 2 (SDG 2); the targets of ending hunger (SDG Target 2.1) and all forms of malnutrition (SDG Target 2.2). It further provides global estimates on the number of people who are unable to afford a healthy diet. This report has consistently emphasised since its 2017 Edition that nations are falling short of SDG2 Targets. This is due to the escalation and interdependence of conflict, harsh weather conditions, economic downturns and slowdowns as well as high cost of nutritious foods and rising inequality.
The theme of this report is Urbanisation, agrifood systems transformation, and healthy diets across the rural-urban continuum, which is timely and relevant for several reasons. As a consequence, it aims to eradicate food insecurity and malnutrition by providing affordable healthy diets.
The 2023 Report has explored the links between urbanisation and changing food systems and how these changes are impacting the availability, affordability, and desirability of healthy diets, food security and malnutrition in all its forms. It demonstrates that an examination of the rural-urban continuum would be necessary in order to comprehend the ways that urbanisation has been influencing food systems. The distinction between the rural and urban areas has been getting more and more obscure and less distinct in space as urbanisation has been on the rise. Agrifood systems have been altering as a result of the shifting demographic agglomeration patterns along this rural-urban continuum. This has presented opportunities as well as challenges in ensuring that everyone has the access to reasonably priced healthy food. The report further throws light on the forces behind urbanisation, its trends, and dynamics from the perspective of rural-urban continuum. It has also given fresh insights into how urbanisation has affected the supply and demand of food throughout this continuum. To supplement this, the report has provided further analyses for a few chosen countries on the difference in the cost and affordability of a healthy diet as well as in food security and malnourishment across rural-urban divide.
Building on these insights, the report has suggested new initiatives, financial commitments, and technological advancements to meet the obstacles and seize the chances presented by urbanisation. This would ensure access to affordable healthy food for everyone, across the rural-urban continuum. Through the findings of this report, governments would be able to identify difficulties caused due to urbanisation and frame suitable policies, technologies, investments, and governance mechanisms to assist solve them by mapping the interlinkages throughout the rural-urban continuum.
Key Findings from the Report
Global hunger The prevalence of undernourishment which has been a measure of global hunger has been based on SDG indicator 2.1.1. It has stayed mostly unchanged between 2021 and 2022, and is still significantly higher than pre-COVID-19 levels. In 2022, 9.2 per cent of the world’s population was affected by hunger as compared to 7.9 per cent in 2019.
It has been estimated that about 691 to 783 million people around the world faced hunger in 2022. In comparison to 2019, before the global pandemic, 122 million more individuals experienced hunger in 2022, taking the middle range (about 735 million) into account.
While there has been some progress in lowering hunger in Latin America and Asia in 2021 and 2022, hunger in Western Asia, the Caribbean, and all of Africa’s subregions have been on the rise.
Nearly 600 million people are expected to suffer from chronic malnourishment by 2030. This would be about 119 million people more than in a scenario in which neither the pandemic nor the war in Ukraine had occurred, around 23 million more than if the war in Ukraine had not happened. This emphasises how challenging it would be to meet the SDG target of ending hunger, especially in Africa.
State of global nutrition Following an unprecedented rise from 2019 to 2020, the prevalence of moderate or severe food insecurity worldwide (SDG indicator 2.1.2) has remained stable for the second year in a row. In 2022, there were about 900 million people, which is about 11.3 per cent of the world’s population) who were highly food insecure. This was accounting to nearly 29.6 per cent of the 2.4 billion people who were moderately or food insecure worldwide.
Globally, women and those living in rural areas have been disproportionately affected by food insecurity. In 2022, 33.3 per cent of adults living in rural areas reported having moderate or severe food insecurity, as compared to 28.8 per cent in peri-urban areas and 26 per cent in urban areas. After widening in the wake of pandemic, the gender gap in global food insecurity has shrunk from 3.8 percentage points in 2021 to 2.4 percentage points in 2022.
In 2021, 42 per cent of the global population or over 3.1 billion people lacked access to nutritious food. The number of people who could not afford a healthy diet actually decreased by 52 million between 2020 and 2021, despite the fact that there has been an overall rise of 134 million people as compared to 2019 prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Malnutrition in children In 2022, globally, an estimated 37 million children (5.6 per cent) were overweight, 45 million children (6.8 per cent) were suffering from wasting, and 148.1 million children (22.3 per cent) under the age of five were stunted. While overweight children were almost more common in urban areas, stunting and wasting were more common in rural areas.
Although there has been steady progress in lowering stunting in children under the age of five and promoting exclusive breastfeeding for the first six months of birth, globally, there are no signs of meeting the SDG 2030 Targets. There has been very little improvement in terms of overweight and low birthweight of children; however, the prevalence of wasting has been more than twice as high as 2030 Target.
Impact of urbanisation on agrifood systems With about 70 per cent of the world’s population expected to live in cities by 2050, rising urbanisation has been causing changes in agrifood systems throughout the rural-urban continuum. These changes offer chances as well as problems for ensuring that everyone has access to affordable healthy foods.
A growing number of affordable, convenient and pre-made fast foods are readily available; however, these foods are often energy dense and high in fats, sugars and/or salt. This could lead to malnutrition. There has been insufficient supply of fruits and vegetables to meet everyone’s daily requirement for a healthy diet. Further, small farmers have been excluded from formal value chains, and, urbanisation has also resulted in the loss of natural capital and lands.
However, there are also benefits of urbanisation. Longer, more structured, and more sophisticated food value chains have led to more income-generating off-farm jobs, especially for women and youth and a wider range of nutrient-dense foods. When urban areas get closer to rural areas, farmers often have better access to agricultural inputs and services.
Food supply and demand across the rural-urban continuum A rural-urban continuum lens is necessary for comprehending the changes that have been taking place in agrifood systems, including food production, processing, distribution, and procurement as well as consumer behaviour. This lens would reflect the increasing connectivity and interlinkages between urban, peri-urban, and rural areas.
Changes in the supply and demand of food along the rural-urban continuum has been accelerating in Africa, too. In Africa, the shares of food insecure population unable to afford a balanced diet are among the highest in the world. These changes have already been seen in Asia and Latin America. This shift in diet is being driven by the wide expansion of off-farm employment as well as the interconnectedness of food supply networks and markets along the rural-urban continuum.
The preconceived notion that food purchases account for a minor portion of rural households’ food consumption in Africa has been called into question by new data for 11 countries in Western, Eastern, and Southern Africa. In these countries, food purchases have become common in urban homes. It is also noteworthy that rural households, even those who live far from an urban centre, too, have been purchasing foods.
Cost and affordability of a healthy diet According to the new findings, the notion that there have been significant differences in purchasing patterns between urban and rural areas has been proved to be incorrect. Although consumption of processed foods, especially highly processed foods has been higher in urban regions in the 11 African countries which were studied. It has only progressively decreased when it came to peri-urban and rural areas. Furthermore, in terms of overall food intake, consumption of fruits, vegetables, and fats and oils remained rather consistent throughout the rural-urban continuum.
Due to their increased reliance on food purchases, households in peri-urban and rural areas have been finding it increasingly important to afford a healthy diet. A healthy meal may cost less in the 11 African nations that were subject of the study; however, affordability has still been lower than that in urban centres. In order to provide healthy diet, low-income households in peri-urban and rural areas would need to more than double their food expenditure, which has been a significant disadvantage.
With the growing issue of excessive consumption of highly processed foods and food away from home in urban areas, which has been gradually expanding into peri-urban and rural areas, the prevalence of overweight children is at risk of rising.
Policies and Solutions
The accessibility to affordable healthy diets should be increased while this would lead to food security and nutrition for all. In order to achieve this, policy and legislation are needed. For this, there should be leveraging the growing interconnectedness between rural and peri-urban areas and cities of different sizes.
Greater economic development and access to affordable healthy diets could be possible by the closer connections between the various components of the agrifood systems. These opportunities could be taken advantage of by making investments in public goods, infrastructure, and improved capacities that increase rural-urban connectivity. The vital role that small-and medium-sized businesses play in agrifood systems should be supported by such investments, especially in small and intermediate cities and towns.
In order to develop technology and innovations for healthier food environments and for boosting the availability and affordability of nutritious foods, there is a need for more public investment in research and development. For achieving an increase, the ability of urban and peri-urban agriculture in order to provide wholesome food in cities and towns, technology could be especially significant.
In order to coordinate coherent investment across sectoral and administrative boundaries and leverage connection throughout the rural-urban continuum, sufficient governance mechanisms and institutions would be needed. Subnational administrations, therefore, could be crucial in formulating and carrying out policies that transcend outside the conventional hierarchical framework. By involving pertinent agrifood systems, governance should guarantee policy coherence among local, regional, and national settings.
Key Highlights on India
- India has the lowest cost of a healthy diet among BRICS nations (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia, and the UAE) and its neighbours. In 2021, a healthy diet in India cost approximately 3.066 purchasing power parity (PPP) per person per day. Despite the low cost, affordability remains an issue due to low average incomes.
A diet is considered unaffordable if it costs more than 52 per cent of a nation’s average income. India’s low average income makes it difficult for a significant portion of the population to afford the recommended diet.
- In a case study of Mumbai, the cost of meals has increased by 65 per cent in five years, while salaries and wages have only risen by 28–37 per cent during the same period. Mumbai’s data highlights the challenges faced by urban populations in India.
- While the cost of a healthy diet in India is relatively low, it remains unattainable for a large portion of the population due to income disparities. In 2021, 74 per cent of Indians could not afford a healthy diet, placing India at fourth place among the nations considered in terms of affordability issues.
India’s Response to the Report
The ‘Proportion of Undernourished’ (PoU) in India, according to the report, has been 16.6 per cent. The FAO estimate has been based on the Food Insecurity Experience Scale (FIES) survey, which is an opinion poll with eight questions and the sample size was 3000 respondents. The PoU value for India has been calculated using the data from a miniscule sample, obtained through FIES, for hugely populated country, India. This is not only incorrect and unethical, but it also reeks of obvious bias.
The FAO was urged not to use the estimations based on FIES survey data because of the mentioned issues. In collaboration with the Department of Food and Public Distribution, FAO, Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare, and the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation, a pilot survey on FIES was prepared. This FIES module, comprising a questionnaire, sample design and sample size, was recommended for modification by the technical group which was established for this purpose. However, for the report, the FAO’s FIES-based PoU estimate was used.
The Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana (PMGKAY), an initiative of the central government, was designed to mitigate the hardships of the poor and needy due to the economic disruptions brought about by the COVID-19 outbreak in the country. Free food grains were distributed under the PMGKAY in addition to regular distribution done under the National Food Security Act 2013. Approximately, 1,118 lakh metric tonnes of food grains had been allotted under the PMGKAY (phase I-VII) for a 28-month period with an estimated financial outlay of approximately Rs. 3.91 lakh crore between 2020–21 and 2022–23 which has benefitted approximately 800 million people. PMGKAY, the largest global food security programme has been extended for providing free food grains to Antyodaya Anna Yojana and Priority Households beneficiaries.
Conclusion
Global hunger was not worsened between 2021 and 2022; however, there are many places in the world that have been experiencing an increase in hunger. Increase in energy prices and food and livelihood disruptions due to violent conflicts and extreme weather have been causing a rise in hunger in many regions. There has been progress on child nutrition indicators in many regions and would meet the 2030 Nutrition targets. Nonetheless, rise in overweight and obesity in many countries signals an increase in the prevalence of non-communicable diseases.
The agrifood systems, governance mechanisms, and institutions are required to transcend sectoral and administrative boundaries in order to implement these solutions. For this, they should rely on subnational and local governments. They have been the key players in utilising multilevel and multistakeholder mechanisms. The concrete examples of this reports have proven successful in putting into practice crucial policies and solutions for ensuring that everyone has access and could afford healthy diets.
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