In 2009, the World Food Programme (WFP) shipped approximately enough food aid to feed 5.9 million people in Sudan. As food aid is shipped into the country, thousands of tons of wheat and rice are almost simultaneously exported to other nations. The paradox is that Sudan is unable to feed its domestic population, yet exports tons of food supplies to nations such as China, South Korea, and Saudi Arabia.  Why?

840,000 hectares of Sudanese land are set aside for countries such as these, who pay large sums of money to the Sudanese government to utilize plots of land in order to promote food security in their respective nations. This fairly recent phenomenon, which reached large scale degrees in 2007, was the rough result of the perceived inability of the international commodity markets to be adequately regulated and thus able to provide sustaining amounts of commodities to nations.

World Bank estimates total about 50 million hectares, mostly in developing African nations, to be leased to other countries. Sovereign wealth funds and government based corporations partake in long term leases, concessions, or outright purchases that range anywhere from 30 – 99 years. Sometimes the details of such acquisitions are undisclosed for records.

Nations participating in land purchases include China and the United Arab Emirates, who have secured deals with the Democratic Republic of Congo and Senegal.  Ethiopia is also an active participant, and disclosed that three million hectares were for lease as of September 2009.

Discontent regarding these deals is already rife, with local farmers protesting the poor work conditions and unequal distribution effects of such contracts.  Low pay, land displacement, and loss of access to pastoral lands have been consequences within countries such as Ethiopia.

UN Food and Agricultural Office (FAO) director general Jacques Diouf spoke of the necessity of private investment as a means of promoting economic development while balancing the fairness and sustenance for local populations.

Posted by Patricia Lee.

World Food Program (WFP) officials have stated that UN cutbacks in food aid funding to Nepal have been caused by the drastic financial market downturns and global financial crisis. The UN estimates that it would need roughly $20 million to feed approximately 600,000 people for the next three months – a quarter of the number that was being supplied in the past.

While WFP currently supplies around 2.2 million people with food aid in Nepal, if critical funding is not given in the next few days, more than 250,000 more will be affected by the shortages.

Nepal is in a precarious state of affairs, having emerged from a decade-long civil war with Maoists that wreaked havoc on the population and state at large.  With a weakened post-war economy; elevated food prices, natural disasters such as monsoon rains, and an enormous grain deficit have forced numerous Nepalis to resort to drastic measure to withstand the crisis, including selling their assets, taking their children out of school, and facing hunger.  Child malnutrition is at an all-time high for the country, which already holds one of the highest rates in the world, with almost half of the child population underfed.

Posted by Patricia Lee

The BBC recently reported on the recent Eritrean government’s decision to reject international food aid in an effort to promote self-sustaining measures for domestic food growth and measures for prolonged self-sufficiency/sustainability. Eritrean ambassador to the EU, Girma Asmerom, stated quite matter-of-factly “Food aid demonizes the local population and makes them lazy.”

The current government strategies of confiscating and distributing food from areas that have had a bumper harvest have been met with mixed results.  Some Eritreans that have fled across the border to refugee camps in northern Ethiopia have attributed their government’s policies to causing widespread hunger.

Food aid officials, including U.N under secretary general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief John Holmes have been skeptical of the Eritrean government’s approach, saying,  “When we ask the government if they need help they say ‘no’, but we remain concerned to track the situation.”

Posted by Patricia Lee

Overview
In the past year, global food security has been on the radar of world leaders, who often raised food security issues and brought needed attention to the continuing food crisis and long-term concerns.  Policy breakthroughs and substantial action, however, were limited.

The challenge was most starkly illustrated by a joint report released by the UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) and World Food Programme (WFP) during World Food Week (October 12-16) that said that over 1.02 billion in the world are hungry.  During a High-Level Expert Panel convened during the week, FAO Director-General Jacques Diouf cited that a fast-growing global population would require 5 times the food production to meet needs by 2050.  At the UN’s World Food Summit in November, these challenges seemed to fall on deaf ears, as major global leaders did not attend the meeting and a proposal to direct global food security efforts away from aid toward an expanded local capability to grow food, was rejected.

Another major focus of the blog was food safety in the United States.  After several high profile cases of contamination of peanuts and pistachios (by salmonella) and even Nestlé’s Toll House cookie dough, which had batches contaminated by E. Coli, the Obama administration took several steps to address the food safety.  The appointment of a new Food and Drug Administration Commissioner, the convening of a Food Safety Working Group and a new clearinghouse for information, www.foodsafety.gov are positive steps, whose true results will take time to measure.

Person of the Year
The Global Food Security blog covered many events and people involved in food security that to highlight any one individual would be a big challenge.  Instead, we will choose someone who is often behind the scenes, the food aid workers who each year work to deliver food aid to some of those most in need.  They see the faces of the hungry at their most desperate and often operate in remote areas or conflict zones, placing themselves in peril in order to help others.

Most Unexpected Event

Since the global food crisis was first acknowledged roughly two years ago, public awareness about the ongoing supply issue and its effects has been on the steady incline.  In recent months, global food security has assumed center stage at a number of U.S. and international government meetings.  In March, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee held a hearing on the food crisis after a bill co-sponsored by Senators Bob Casey, Jr. (PA) and Richard Lugar (IN) was introduced before Congress; in April, President Obama announced a food crisis initiative to include another $1 billion for the development of long-term food security strategy during the annual G-20 summit; and the UN hosted a food crisis summit in Copenhagen in November.  Discussing the challenges involved in combating food insecurity is important, and building frameworks for solutions is needed, but this specialized attention to the issue came as a pleasant surprise in the last year.

What to Expect

It is difficult to predict what the coming year will mean for the food crisis, but indicators suggest that the issue will continue to be problematic.

As this blog has often cited, the production of grain for consumption and for the procurement of meat from animals that eat it requires the use of fossil fuels.  When oil prices rise, the ability to produce foodstuffs declines, and the food that is produced is sold at higher cost.   The International Energy Agency announced on 11 December that the demand for oil in 2010 will be slightly greater than the increase they had already projected, which may make for a bad year in food growth and pricing.

Growth is also thwarted by weather events like droughts or intense storms, such as monsoons.  2010 is projected to be warmer than average - the weather system El Niño is expected to last until May, bringing with it warmer air and water temperatures.  Irregular and/or protracted weather patterns may make for inhospitable environments for food growth.

Innovations in food technologies and international efforts to combat insecurity and inaccessibility to foodstuffs have yet to be seen, and the elements that work against these progressions have yet to take hold.  In the coming year, the FPA Food Security blog will keep you atuned to all of these developments.

Watch this space…

A recent report by the Department of Agriculture has shed light on some shocking numbers about the food security of Americans.   Last year, the Department reports, the number of Americans that did not have consistent access to food jumped from 36 million to 49 million, the highest increase since 1995.

As reported in The New York Times, the methodology of the report has been challenged by conservative analysts because of its vague survey questions.

The New York Times did present the following analysis of the report’s numbers:

The increase, of 13 million Americans, was much larger than even the most pessimistic observers of hunger trends had expected and cast an alarming light on the daily hardships caused by the recession’s punishing effect on jobs and wages.

About a third of these struggling households had what the researchers called “very low food security,” meaning lack of money forced members to skip meals, cut portions or otherwise forgo food at some point in the year.

The other two-thirds typically had enough to eat, but only by eating cheaper or less varied foods, relying on government aid like food stamps, or visiting food pantries and soup kitchens.

The politics of food in the U.S. is discussed in the article, especially how the word “hunger” has become politically charged when describing the lack of access to food in the United States.  The article also touches on some of the causes of increased hunger in the U.S., including food prices and the financial crisis.

A new edition of the annual The State of Food Insecurity in the World 2009 report was  released jointly today by the UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) and World Food Programme (WFP).  Subtitled “Economic Crises - Impact and lessons learned,” the report looks at the convergence of the recent global food crisis that hit the world from 2006-2008 and the global economic crisis that began in late 2007 and continues to affect financial markets as well as global food supplies today.

FAO estimates that due to the crisis, over 1.02 billion people were hungry in 2009 around the world.

To examine the “impact” of the crises. the report offers cases studies of Armenia, Bangladesh, Ghana, Nicaragua, and Zambia  in order to show how the global economic crisis (which unlike other crises that affected one country or a region) affected all global markets, particularly impacting developing countries.

In presenting the “lessons learned,” the report recommends short-term solutions such as food safety-net programs to fight hunger and poverty.  Long-term solutions include increased development aid, expertise sharing and new domestic policies to help the most vulnerable countries provide food more consistently and readily for their people.

The recent issue of Time Magazine reflects on how America eats, what it pays for its food and the source of its food supply.  Citing that:

For all the grumbling you do about your weekly grocery bill, the fact is you’ve never had it so good, at least in terms of what you pay for every calorie you eat. According to the USDA, Americans spend less than 10% of their incomes on food, down from 18% in 1966.

The article discusses how the rise of corn as an ingredient in many foods has increased the supply of food available to Americans.  Over time, the agricultural subsidies paid to produce corn, large-scale farm operations and consumer preferences have contributed to a cycle of cheaper, but in some cases, less healthy food.  Several recent high-profile recalls, the use of antibiotics in raising farm animals and health problems like diabetes are increasing the concerns of many Americans about their food supply.

The article also discusses the environmental impact of large-scale food production, as well as the effect it has on prices of organic foods and healthier foods like fruits and vegetables.

In addition to the cover story, there is also a comparison of how an organic hamburger is produced versus a conventional hamburger.  There are several photo essays including one that shows families from around the world, detailing the amount they spend on food and what they typically buy.

For you tomato lovers out there, good luck this season. According to Dan Barber’s op-ed piece in the New York Times, tomatoes have been scarce this year, especially in the Northeast United States, and we’ve already seen price increases of 20%. So what’s the problem? Late blight—the same plant disease that caused the Irish potato famine in the mid-nineteenth century—has struck once again. While this year the blight will not lead to widespread famine, we do have a lot to learn from the extensive spread of the disease in tomatoes this year.

What about this year has created a breeding ground for late blight? For one thing, this summer’s humidity and abundance of precipitation has done more than just make your hair frizzy. Late blight loves warm temperatures, high humidity, and lots of rain.

But weather is only part of this formula. Where our tomato plants come from also plays a large part. Experts say that there was a prevalence of late blight in industrial breeding facilities which distributed starter plants across the country via large chains such as Home Depot, Kmart, Lowe’s and Wal-Mart. Expediting the contamination process is an increased interest in gardening and growing locally. According to the National Gardening Association, 7 million more households have either planted small gardens in their homes or invested in a community garden. So instead of spreading through large farms, late blight has contaminated people’s backyards. This is the irony of the situation: the people who are conscious of the problems with the traditional food system and buy and grow food locally are actually causing a dreadful situation for tomato lovers and growers.

The problem, according to the article, is that people these days are not as educated about agriculture. An increased interest and conscientiousness exists, but experience does not, resulting in a lack of diversity in growing methods and crop variety.

Ultimately, Barber believes that food should not be grown just for yield, but for taste and heartiness as well. If we learned to grow tomatoes that were specific to the many climates in our country, he says, late blight might not have spread across all the different varieties.

For more information on late blight, click here.

The soaring price of food was one of the drivers of the Global Food Crisis, making it difficult for people to purchase food for themselves or feed for their animals.  The Financial Times cites a biannual United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) report that states that amount spent globally on  food supplies will decrease for 2009, following their all-time highs in 2008.  The damage done by the global financial crisis may be,

“Eroding purchasing power through a combination of falling incomes and real exchange rates… [afflicting] the affordability of food, however cheap it has become on the international market place.”

The report forecasts a building danger from natural disasters, which could hurt food availability and the recent spikes in the prices of staple foods like corn, wheat and soybeans.

This article by Lester Brown, founder of the Earth Policy Institute, appears in the May 2009 issue of Scientific American magazine.

In his analysis, Brown argues that causal factors such as the current world order, water shortages, eroding soil, and rising global temperatures are threatening not only the global food supply, but world civilization as a whole because of it.  He warns that a lack of widespread intervention on the latter three environmental factors, global water tables in particular, could push governments in poorer countries to collapse, with the resulting failed states threatening global security.

Brown also argues that the current food crisis is of concern for reasons beyond food shortage issues of the past.  He cites examples of event-driven shortages, such as droughts in the 1970s, and charges that today’s food crisis is trend-driven - following the intertwining of food production and the  energy economy as well as the growing world population and shifts in population affluence.  These trend-driven shortages, he says, pose a larger threat because they demand a shift in far-reaching global trends rather than isolated environmental conditions.

He also finds  acts by states to hoard food exports as a result of shortage concerns, worrisome.  These actions drive food prices up and deprive needy states of food imports.  Should that behavior continue, food access could become a forefront motivation in international conflict.

Lester Brown appeared as a guest on the Great Decisions Television Series 2009 episode entitled, “Running Out: The Global Food Crisis.”  The full episode can be viewed here.

Read Brown’s full article and please feel free to react in the “Comments” section below.