The recent UN Food and Agriculture Organisation's (FAO) forecast on the future of global food situation is no tiny blip to be ignored. Although the forecast is rather too generalised and reflects on a scenario not very close to the present times, the caution should be seriously noted.
The world must increase its food production by 60 per cent by the mid-century or risk serious food shortages that could bring the worst kind of social unrest and civil wars, said Hiroyuki Konuma, the assistant director-general of FAO Asia-Pacific region at a week-long international food security conference recently. The FAO forecast says demand for food will rise rapidly over the next few decades as the world population surpasses 9.0 billion and wealthy people increasingly improve their diets, consuming more calories.
The reason for much of FAO's concern is based on the fact that despite the increasing need for more food, the world is not spending sufficiently on agricultural research, causing many scientists to doubt whether food production can keep up with demand growth. The challenge is especially demanding in developing nations, which need to boost crops by a staggering 77 per cent, the UN agency warns. In the absence of the measures in place, the Asia-Pacific region with more than half a billion chronically hungry people would be hit hard, even if the region meets its millennium development goal of cutting that number to 12 per cent of the population. Despite progress made in fighting global hunger, the world still has 842 million undernourished people, according to FAO, of which nearly two-thirds live in the Asia-Pacific.
The UN body outlined two main options: increase arable land areas and boost productivity rates. But available arable land is almost fully exploited, and production growth rates have been lacklustre for the past two decades.
During the green revolution in the 1980s, productivity rates for rice and wheat increased by 3.5 per cent annually, but for the past 20 years the rate has been stuck at 0.6 to 0.8 per cent. Water scarcity in big food-producing nations like China is worsening, and many farmers are increasingly tempted to shift production from food to bio-energy, a popular option to cut emissions of climate-changing greenhouse gases. Climate change is worsening the situation, as more frequent extreme weather events devastate crops. In the past three years, Australia, Canada, China, Russia and the United States have all suffered big harvest losses from floods and droughts. Cost is an additional threat to food security, according to the UN body. High and volatile food prices restrict poor people's access to food, while high crude oil prices inflate production costs.
The rise in food prices is already a threat most countries are finding difficult to fight. Global food prices rose by 2.6 per cent in February this year in the sharpest climb since mid-2012. FAO's price index, which measures monthly price changes for a basket of cereals, oilseeds, dairy, meat and sugar, averaged 208.1 points in February, up 5.2 points from a slightly revised January index of 202.9. Unfavourable weather conditions in the southern hemisphere and parts of the United States were the most important cause of the rise. In February, prices rose in all commodity groups except meat. The strongest rise was in the sugar sub-index, up 6.2 per cent from January due to concerns of crop damage from dry weather in Brazil and forecasts indicating a drop of output in India. The vegetable oil price index rose 4.9 per cent on the previous month, the second-largest increase among the indices after sugar. This was driven by strengthening palm and soya oil prices due to dry weather in Southeast Asia and South America. A 3.6 rise in the cereal price index reflects concerns over the effect of freezing weather on wheat crops in the United States, according to FAO.
Another FAO report released recently says the world could face a food crisis of the kind seen in 2007/08, when a mix of high oil prices, growing use of bio-fuels, bad weather, soaring grain futures markets and restrictive export policies pushed up prices of food, sparking violent protests in many countries. In fact, a good deal of the situation prevalent at that time was due to, besides the draught-fuelled crisis and poor harvest, the over cautious policies adopted by many countries, especially those with grain buffers.
A senior economist and grain analyst of FAO Abdolreza Abbassian told Reuters that there is a potential for a situation to develop like that in 2007-08, if food-secure countries repeat their policies too sensitively as they did then. However, he has been reported as saying, 'There is an expectation that this time around we will not pursue bad policies and intervene in the market by restrictions, and if that doesn't happen we will not see such a serious situation as 2007/08. But if those policies get repeated, anything is possible.' It may be recalled that a number of major grain producers imposed various restrictions on exports in an attempt to control domestic prices during the 2007/08 crisis, including outright bans as well as quotas or higher tariffs on exports of foods including rice, corn and wheat. The restrictions reduced supply in international markets, driving prices even higher.
The FAO index does not suggest any indication of hike in the prices of rice in near future. However, for Bangladesh, there are reasons to worry when it comes to some of the major food products - sugar, soybean oil, pulses and wheat - sourcing of which is largely dependent on imports. The impact of the soaring prices has already begun to manifest in the country's import bills for wheat. It has been learnt that in a little over a month, Bangladesh's import price of wheat rose from US$ 280 to US$ 335 a tonne. If the situation persists, similar experiences may have to be faced in cases of edible oil, poultry feed, sugar and pulses.
As for rice, although the present buffer, as a result of successive bumper harvests, does not appear to call for a cause of immediate worry, imports are on the increase. Rice and wheat imports rose to 1.87 million tonnes between July and January from 0.95 million tonnes in the same period a year ago, according to food ministry data. It can be assumed that the price difference between domestic and international markets has encouraged the private sector to import. It has been learnt that rice and wheat prices are currently lower in the international market than a year ago, while local rice and wheat prices have risen in recent months.
Taking stock of the overall situation, it is important that the authorities pay attention to, among other things, effective monitoring of market availability of goods to avert interplay of undesirable forces in the market.
wasiahmed.bd@hotmail.com
Global food scenario
Wasi Ahmed | Published: April 22, 2014 00:00:00 | Updated: November 30, 2026 06:01:00
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