Home >> South Asia >> Nepal & Bhutan

     Email   Print 

Rising food insecurity in Nepal

Bhuwan Thapaliya - 8/7/2009

Hunger kills more people in the world than any other disease. Every day approximately 25000 people die from hunger and hunger related illness. Today, one in nearly seven people does not get enough food to be healthy and lead an active life, making hunger and malnutrition the number one risk to health worldwide according to the World Food Programme (WFP). Furthermore, it has been reported by The Economist that the domestic food prices in about 46 developing countries are higher than 12 months ago and this could easily pave the way for more hunger related problems leading to death.

Recent estimates from the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization predicts that the number of hungry people on the planet this year will reach a historic high of 1.02 billion, almost a sixth of humanity – more than ever before. The hunger is tending to inflate more because the global economy is expected to shrink by 1.7% this year according to the International Monetary Fund. With unemployment running high, financial setbacks, and the soaring food prices, hunger is eroding the very core of the food deficit countries. The World Bank has estimated that until 2015 the crisis will lead to between 200,000 and 400,000 more children dying every year.

Global life expectancy had increased from 45 years in the early 1950s to around 65 years lately. However, many countries have failed to reap the health gain benefits and the worst financial crisis after the 1930s recession and its ripple effects threatened to reverse the gains in most of the underdeveloped nations such as Nepal . Life expectancy at birth in Nepal has increased to 64, but despite some improvements in health sectors - food deficiency and hunger continues to be a problem in Nepal and the problem is alarming – 41 percent of the populations are believed to be undernourished.

Nepal, with a population of approximately 27 million people, is suffering from acute food crisis led astray by Koshi river flood last August and severe winter drought – one of the worst in the country’s history. More than two million people are at high risk of food insecurity, according to a joint assessment report releases by the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives (MoAC), the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the UN World Food Programme (WFP). For the first time in the country's history, local production is not capable of meeting its needs - food stockpiles are 20% lower than in 2008.

The combination of high food prices and the economic downturn has the makings of a grave humanitarian crisis in Nepal (Ranks 142 out of 177 countries in the Human Development Index in 2007) as it has been estimated that 41 of the 75 districts are food deficit. This reveals the grave nutritional statistics across Nepal – Half of children under the age of five in these districts are stunted, while 39 percent of children are underweight and 13 percent are severely malnourished according to the WFP. Meanwhile in some areas chronic malnutrition rates for children under 5 are 80 percent with acute malnutrition rates as high as 23 percent reports WFP. Unfortunately, these realities are not subjected to change in the near future as most Nepalese families survive as subsistence farmers with 24 percent of the population living on less than US$1 per day.

Adverse weather conditions led to poor agriculture performance but there are other reasons too. Low investment in the farm, climate change, the real estate boom which encouraged people to use available lands for housing, slow progress in technological adaptation and innovation in farm practices due to the low literacy levels among the rural poor, low mechanization rates, inability to produce on a mass scale because of restrictions on land ownership, limited knowledge of the quality aspects of production, distribution and marketing, poverty, floods and landslides, are the major reasons for the low agricultural productivity.

There is little dispute that food demand will grow rapidly in Nepal . Hence, in principle it might be possible to reduce food demand directly by restraining population growth. Experts suggest that this is possible only through massive social intervention or through social change that occurs only when countries are relatively rich. But Nepal is poor and our economic indicators are fragile. Though we boast about the achievements of the 21st century, much of Nepal remains crippled by starvation, poverty and hunger. But what is at the root of these problems? Many complain of improper use of aid, poverty, and unfair trade terms, but experts cite that most nations are destined to be hungry because of their own internal reasons, whether they be civil war, bad politics, corruption, low investment in the agricultural sector and so on.

In laying the analytical basis of the fight against hunger, an alternative worth adopting is the examination of linkage among economic growth, social stability, poverty and hunger. Through economic growth and social stability are strongly linked, the causal mechanics are still being debated. Therefore, systematic hunger alleviation through effective policy continues to be difficult to accomplish in Nepal . Nonetheless, Nepal must work to build the long term solutions to hunger but due attention has to be taken immediately in the short run to feed those who are hungry as the crop yield in some districts in Mid- and Far- Western Nepal have dropped by more than half, and the search for such a solution should be motivated by the need for self- sufficiency.

WFP report revealed that 2008/2009 winter drought reduced the wheat and barley production by 14 and 17 percent respectively. The Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives (MOAC) predicts that the average maize production will decline by about 20 percent due to the late monsoon and drought. Reports from various districts confirm that farmers could not start planting rice due to the late monsoon. Considering so, the ministry predicts that the agricultural growth rate will be very nominal in the current fiscal year.

So how are we to fill the vacuum - as the case study of Nepal refers to the problem of distorted national priorities in the face of growing food deficiency? The Nepal Food Corporation (NFC) is supplying food to the districts, which are hardest hit by the crisis but experts say that it is not enough as government has allocated a budget that can meet only half of the demand. The government in its annual budget has expressed commitment to the people’s right to food security but experts cite that without the introduction of a concrete food policy, the government’s promises are unlikely to reap any benefits.

41out of 75 districts in Nepal , it is said, are being torn apart by a food crisis. However, there is no alternative to a sound economic growth if poverty and hunger are to be reduced; and in countries like Nepal this can only be attained by promoting agriculture which contributes 33 percent of the GDP. For meeting the grave food security challenges faced by the Nation, an active grass root movement and a strong political commitment to increase food production through restoring the diversity of farms would be the number one precondition. This requires essential policy modifications to set up more effective links between food security and workable agricultural development strategies. The heart and soul of the new food security strategy should be better access of poor families to both - the farm and the food.