RTÉ.ie journalist Blathnaid Healy talks to UCD lecturer Dr Majda Bne Saad about food security in the developing world.
A person is food secure when at all times they have access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food to maintain a healthy and active life, according to the World Health Organization.
‘Poverty is the root cause of food insecurity,’ said Dr Majda Bne Saad, a lecturer in University College Dublin who is an expert on food security.
The number of people who are considered food insecure has increased from 890m in 2005 to 1bn in 2009.
Most developed countries are spending the majority of their overseas aid budgets making people more food secure, and $20bn was pledged for food security initiatives at a meeting of the G8 in L’Aquila in July 2009.
To coincide with the G8’s decision, the Irish Government announced it was making the eradication of hunger the ‘cornerstone’ of its overseas development programme – concentrating 20% of its total budget in this area.
While triggers like climate change, drought and floods can affect a person’s access to food, the most important part of being food secure is being able to earn money or have products to trade for food, Dr Saad said.
Food prices, which started to increase in 2002 and reached their peak in 2007, are another factor affecting people’s capacity to buy food.
‘Not only the poor but also the middle class have been joining the queues for help from governments because of rising food prices,’ Dr Saad said.
The increasing amount of land being devoted to bio-fuel crops and the subsidies from the US and some European countries are affecting food prices, Dr Saad said.
‘This trend is going to continue because of energy security,’ she said.
India and China have experienced spectacular economic growth in recent years, and a subsequent rise in demand for grains in these countries has also driven food prices up.
This has been further compounded by some countries placing restrictions on their exports.
People in developing countries who live on $1 a day generally experience chronic food insecurity and they are the ones who, when exposed to change, end up being the victims of famine.
Families who rely on subsistence farming, or growing to eat, are very vulnerable particularly in countries like Kenya where they do not have access to good markets to sell into, Dr Saad said.
One of the best ways to make people food secure, according to the food security lecturer, is to give subsistence farmers access to markets, giving them greater incentive to grow more crops and produce more food to meet the demand.
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