Worse Hunger Crises Are Getting Lesser Attention: Report

The number of people suffering from hunger crisis has risen by 18 per cent faster than the funding provided to them. These are the findings of a report titled  “2023 Hunger Funding Gap Report: What’s Needed to Stop the Global Hunger Crisis”, conducted by a global organisation ‘Action Against Hunger’. 

According to this report, countries facing intense hunger crises received lesser hunger funding than the countries that have comparatively lesser hunger crises. The report mentioned countries like Kenya and Mozambique, which received higher funding than the countries like Haiti and Afghanistan, which are suffering from the worst hunger crisis due to multiple factors. Further, the report also noted that United Nations (UN) fulfils half of the funding needs of the global hunger situation. 

Among the terrific catastrophes of the world, hunger is counted as the prime one that is taking away several lives every year. Governments and authorities roll in a number of policies to deal with the hunger crisis. 

However, the increasing population and squeezing resources make it difficult for the countries to execute anti-hunger policies effectively. As per the data of ‘The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI) report’ that has been released by the World Health Organisation (WHO), said 828 million people were affected by hunger in 2021. This is 46 million people more than the year earlier and 150 million more from 2019. 

Apart from global space, India’s 107th rank in the recent global hunger index cannot be neglected. With the pace at which India’s population is increasing and the kind of social structure India has, the country needs a meticulous step. 

A retired professor of the Centre for the Study of Regional Development, Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) and a former alumna of Delhi School of Economics, Ravi Srivastava commenting on the report said, “We do not have a direct indicator of hunger whether in the form cereal intake or Body Mass Index (BMI). It is partly related to high food prices and low income, we have still a larger number of households whose food security and nutrition security need to be addressed. In the case of India, this issue is more related to food security factors and environmental factors.”

Srivastava also added that in the case of countries like Afghanistan, there are more external factors and political instabilities responsible for a less effective hunger eradication approach. 

Further, Prof Srivastava also noted that in India, apart from the central level of programs, efforts need to be more decentralised in nature and state and district authorities should also take steps ahead in order to address the hunger issue. 

The collaborative efforts of state government and local authorities along with the leadership of the central government can be helpful to cut down the hunger problem from its roots. The apex level can bring the policies but the ground-level authorities need to execute them properly so that India would improve its rank in the next Global Hunger Index.