- Figures are in the 2022 The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World report
- The report also looks at ways in which governments can repurpose their current support to agriculture to reduce the cost of healthy diets, mindful of the limited public resources available in many parts of the world.
Image: FILE
The number of hungry people worldwide will rise in all countries, proving the current high food prices are not unique to Kenya, a United Nations food security report shows.
In Kenya, about 1.4 million people are surviving on donated food, while a majority of the rest cannot afford a balanced diet daily.
The 2022 State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World report shows that the number of people affected by hunger globally rose to as many as 828 million in 2021, an increase of about 46 million since 2020 and 150 million since the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The number is still rising, the report says.
The report provides fresh evidence that the world is moving further away from its goal of ending hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition in all its forms by 2030.
The report also looks at ways governments can repurpose their current support to agriculture to reduce the cost of healthy diets, mindful of the limited public resources available in many parts of the world.
It was jointly published by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), the UNICEF, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) and the World Health Organization (WHO).
Ifad President Gilbert Houngbo said,“These are depressing figures for humanity. We continue to move away from our goal of ending hunger by 2030. The ripple effects of the global food crisis will most likely worsen the outcome again next year.”
The report shows almost 3.1 billion people could not afford a healthy diet in 2020, up 112 million from 2019, reflecting the effects of inflation in consumer food prices stemming from the economic impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic and the measures put in place to contain it.
An estimated 45 million children under the age of five were suffering from wasting, the deadliest form of malnutrition, which increases children’s risk of death by up to 12 times.
Furthermore, 149 million children under the age of five had stunted growth and development due to a chronic lack of essential nutrients in their diets, while 39 million were overweight.
Progress is being made on exclusive breastfeeding, with nearly 44 per cent of infants under six months of age being exclusively breastfed worldwide in 2020. This is still short of the 50 per cent target by 2030. Of great concern, two in three children are not fed the minimum diverse diet they need to grow and develop to their full potential.
Kenya is expected to receive maize from Zambia to cushion the public from the current high prices.
“We are working with countries that have enough maize to be able to bring cheaper maize into the Kenyan market to cushion Kenyans from the high cost of maize flour,” said Agriculture CS Peter Munya last week.
The country is currently going through its worst drought in 40 years.
Looking forward, projections are that nearly 670 million people (eight per cent of the world population) will still be facing hunger in 2030 – even if a global economic recovery is taken into consideration, the UN report says.
This is a similar number to 2015, when the goal of ending hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition by the end of this decade was launched under the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
“This report repeatedly highlights the intensification of these major drivers of food insecurity and malnutrition: conflict, climate extremes and economic shocks, combined with growing inequalities,” the heads of the five UN agencies wrote in this year's Foreword.