Food security, or rather insecurity, is one of the most important obstacles that the world’s population needs to overcome, so much so that it is the second goal of the UN Sustainable Development Goals which calls for ‘Zero Hunger’. While the issue is extremely complex and is hurdled by layers of inequalities and injustices, veiled with socio-economic tensions, environmental constraints, and political conflicts – the result is both recurring and distressing: someone, somewhere, ends their day hungry. While this sentiment addresses severe cases of food insecurity, there is also a widespread misconception that this is the only existing challenge when discussing food security in the sense that the issue is purely economic and low-income individuals are incapable of affording food. In reality, food insecurity also includes a reduction in the quality of food sources, a lack of variability of food categories including the nutritional value of these sources, or even a diminished desirability of diet – none of which are tied to patterns of food availability.
In 2020 alone, roughly 2.37 billion people across the world faced food insecurity, with between 720 and 811 million of them facing hunger and severe food insecurity. While 2020 is considered an anomaly year due to the unprecedented and unexpected COVID-19 pandemic, the impacts left behind on the global state of world hunger prevails. This is due to the pandemic worsening the many already existing causes of food insecurity which include conflict, climate variability, and economic slowdowns. Statistics also show that race and ethnicity, gender, social class, income and employment, and disability are major factors that could affect accessibility to nutritional food sources.
Unfortunately, political conflict is the main hurdle of food accessibility, where food systems were recently shown to be severely compromised as a result of the Russia-Ukraine War. Ukraine and Russia’s war creates a two-fold challenge to food security:
1. Both countries are mass producers of grains with both countries accounting for roughly one-third of the world’s wheat supplies
2. Russia and Belarus are the main suppliers of fertilizers that many countries across the world heavily depend on to maintain agricultural yields to fully sustain their economies. Not only did the conflict cause shortages in actual food quantities, but a lack of supply also caused food prices to soar – further restricting low-income households’ abilities to afford food and driving them deeper into an insecurity.
While it is true that political conflicts are the leading cause of food insecurity, extreme weather events are a looming threat that have already impacted millions of individuals across the planet. With the frequency, duration, and intensity of extreme weather events increasing as a result of climate change, food supplies are expected to decrease. For instance, recent intense heatwaves experienced across India have caused a decrease by almost 20% in wheat harvests, and the grains harvested were comparatively smaller than the ones harvested the year before in the absence of the heatwave. Furthermore, as sea levels rise as a result of elevated temperatures, and continued land and water source degradation over time, access to arable farmlands will decrease as well. Not only does this reduce viable areas for farming, but many individuals who depend on farming for their livelihood will also experience food insecurity due to lower incomes and an increased inability to afford and secure food. Therefore, in order to curb the impacts of climate change on global food systems – allowing for the elimination of at least one major obstacle to food security – global initiatives and strategies that address the Global Sustainability Agenda must be prioritized.
Additionally, certain precautions must be observed in order to reduce the risk of food insecurity in the case of political instability or food supply chain perturbances including:
1. Reducing global reliance on food imports and focusing energies on building local food resilience
2. Embracing forward-thinking and sustainable agriculture practices that allow for regionally adapted crops to flourish
3. Promoting research into developing crop and livestock breeds that can tolerate extreme weather conditions
4. Increasing funding to globally recognised food programmes such as the UN World Food Programme that allocate and mobilize food resources in response to food crises.
5. Reducing crop quantities that serve as feedstock for biofuels and commercialized livestock by seeking energy alternatives and adopting sustainable livestock farming Targets and goals such as net-zero emissions by 2050 should be standardized across the world’s nations, and accountability for a lack of commitment and support is necessary.
While reducing food insecurity can be accomplished, the goals would be meaningless unless climate change impacts were addressed first. Furthermore, partnerships between the public, private, and financial sectors are needed to facilitate the seamlessness of global food supply chains. Access to nutritious, high quality, healthy food is a right to every person inhabiting the planet, and the world must collectively seek the needed solutions to ensure that the right to food is honored.
