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Food Insecurity in developing countries

Eliu Figueroa

Arizona State University

Ms.Kardell
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You would think that with all the work the United Nations does there would be less

hungry people around the world. Unfortunately, according to the United Nations worldwide eight

hundred and ninety seven million people suffer from malnourishment and hunger. Every year

five million children die from poor nutrition and many more suffer from malnutrition. It is very

important that a child gets the proper amount of food in its first one thousand days of life to

make sure they develop properly. These people mostly live in underdeveloped and

overpopulated countries, like Afghanistan, Chad, India, and Sudan. This is why one eighth of the

world’s population suffers from hunger.

In discussion of why food insecurity exists there are many beliefs but according to the

article “​Why are so many people in the world hungry?​ ” the main reasons are weather conditions,

population size, lack of money, uneducated farmers, and illness (Elver 2015). Since a lot of these

countries are in desert-like environments droughts play a big role in lack of food. In countries

like India where the population is one billion three hundred million there isn’t exactly a surplus

of food. While some might argue that farmers are doing their best to grow crops the truth is a lot

of the farmers in these countries lack proper techniques and materials for growing crops and

cultivating land. One of the most scarce materials for growing crops is water and a proper

irrigation system. In African countries where illness’ like AIDS and HIV are everywhere,

farmers are unable to do their job because they are too sick to do anything thus causing a

shortage of food. You would think that these people can live on just livestock or crops, but not

having a balanced diet of both meat and fruits or vegetables creates an unbalanced amount of

vitamins and minerals in the body and leads to malnourishment.

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Many people assume that lack of food is just an environmental issue but evidence

suggests that if better refrigeration technology and sustainable energy sources are introduced in

underdeveloped countries than the amount of food that goes to waste will decrease. According to

the article “​ How technology can prevent food waste in developing countries​” around four billion

dollars in food produce is lost every year in India because of the lack of good refrigeration

technology(Earley 2014). Figures from the Food and Agriculture Organisation shows that forty

percent of all produce is lost before it reaches the market in developing countries. This is an issue

where technology exists, imagine the countries where there is no technology at all and how much

these people struggle to maintain fresh food.

There are numerous organisations worldwide that provide aid to the countries that suffer

from food insecurity, like Action Against Hunger and The Hunger Project. You would think that

just giving these people food would be enough but the truth is the only way to stop this is to have

a sustainable source of food. According to “​F​eeding the Developing World: The Search for

Solutions​”​ it is expected that by the year 2050 the world's population will increase to 9.8 billion

(2015). In reality there needs to be a better way to keep food from going bad because a lot of

food goes bad before it can even be sold. There has been development of technology to aid in

this like an indian company called Promethean Power Systems, they use solar energy to keep

milk cool and preventing it from going bad. Despite these inventions very little progress has been

made, why you might ask? It has become common today to dismiss problems that have nothing

to do with them, people of developed countries all over the world simply don’t know this is an

issue or they just don’t care. Many people assume that these people are already being helped by

organizations but according to “ 15 striking world hunger facts” nine million people die
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worldwide because of food scarcity (2017) . This is the equivalent of the entire population of

Arizona and ninety five percent of the New Mexico population dying.

In conclusion, despite the efforts of the United Nations and many organizations there are

eight hundred ninety seven million people worldwide who suffer from malnutrition and hunger.

This results in the death of nine million people and five million of those are unfortunately

children. If the children do not die from hunger they are severely stunted by it and do not

develop properly. People worldwide have no idea of the worldwide hunger problem or just

choose to ignore it because they are unaffected.

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Reference

Borgerson, C., Rajaona, D., Razafindrapaoly, B., Rasolofoniaina, B. J., Kremen, C., &

Golden, C. D. (2017). Links between food insecurity and the unsustainable hunting of wildlife in

a UNESCO world heritage site in Madagascar. ​The Lancet,​ ​389​.

doi:10.1016/s0140-6736(17)31115-7

Earley, K. (2014, December 18). Tech can prevent huge food waste problems in

developing countries. Retrieved from

https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2014/dec/18/technology-prevent-waste-food-

developing-countries

Elver, H. (2015, February 19). Why are there still so many hungry people in the world? |

Hilal Elver. Retrieved from

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2015/feb/19/why-hungry-people-food-

poverty-hunger-economics-mdgs

Food Security in Developing Countries: Is There a Role for the WTO? (2015, May 05).

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Food. (n.d.). Retrieved from ​http://www.un.org/en/sections/issues-depth/food/

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ns/

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Insecure? New Evidence from the Food and Agriculture Organization’s Food Insecurity

Experience Scale. ​World Development,​ ​93​, 402-412. doi:10.1016/j.worlddev.2017.01.006

Smith, M. D., Kassa, W., & Winters, P. (2017). Assessing food insecurity in Latin

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The world's ten hungriest countries. (n.d.). Retrieved from

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Why are so many people in the world hungry? (n.d.). Retrieved from

https://www.worldvision.com.au/global-issues/work-we-do/famine/why-are-so-many-people-in-t

he-world-hungry
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15 Striking World Hunger Statistics. (2018, March 01). Retrieved from

https://borgenproject.org/15-world-hunger-statistics/