Protecting population against damaging impact of food price hike
Friday, 3 April 2009
A UN-sponsored study to have a quantitative assessment of the impact of the spiralling food prices on the family budget, health and nutritional condition of the population has come up with alarming results. It shows that 25 per cent of the families surveyed are living under a condition of food insecurity and they are being compelled to spend 62 per cent of their income to buy food. The situation is still worse among the working class section of the population as 76 per cent of their income is being eaten up by food costs. But in addition to eating, people have to attend to other emergencies, too. They have to pay for the education of their children, bear the medical expenses, buy clothes, travel to places and so on. How are they going to meet all these costs with whatever is left after spending 62 to 76 per cent of their family budget on food?
It has been further learnt from the study that in consequence of exorbitantly high price of foodstuffs during the last two years, 58 per cent of the population surveyed could not buy the amount of food they needed. As a result, they are suffering from malnutrition. If one forgets about the adults for the time being, the condition of the children, especially those in their growing stage, is shocking. Around 2.0 million children aged between six months and below five years are suffering from acute malnutrition, while some five hundred thousand children have already become the victim of permanent malnutrition.
The poor and vulnerable groups hit hard by high food prices are in double jeopardy. They are eating less as well as falling into debt. But the upshots of these food-related hazards are not short-term problems either. The affected population will have to bear the consequences for a very long period of time as they have no means to address the problems thus created and overcome those within a short while. The problem will but drag on until they have the income opportunity to repay their debt as well as overcome their nutritional deficiencies. But in the present circumstances that is but a pipe dream. To be brief, one can say that the socio-economic ramifications of food price hike are far wider and deeper than it may appear on the face of it. The UN survey has described this situation as 'silent emergency'. But the condition of the people hit by unprecedented rise in food price has other consequences that cannot be measured by only the figures found from research.
There are also millions people who have no fixed source of income; neither have they any family budget. No survey team ever reaches them. The condition of this section of the population can only be imagined. They will be in need of immediate government intervention to save their lives. In sum, the UN study report would require the government as well as the multilateral aid agencies to give a much closer attention to the issue of food price hike than it has received so far. Moreover, the problems the study in question has revealed, and which, understandably, are the outcomes of the spiralling prices of essentials, will also not disappear as soon as the prices go down after better harvests or food grains are imported from abroad. So, the government and its international development partners will also need to take into consideration the lasting damage that the price hike of foodstuff does to the families affected by it.
It has been further learnt from the study that in consequence of exorbitantly high price of foodstuffs during the last two years, 58 per cent of the population surveyed could not buy the amount of food they needed. As a result, they are suffering from malnutrition. If one forgets about the adults for the time being, the condition of the children, especially those in their growing stage, is shocking. Around 2.0 million children aged between six months and below five years are suffering from acute malnutrition, while some five hundred thousand children have already become the victim of permanent malnutrition.
The poor and vulnerable groups hit hard by high food prices are in double jeopardy. They are eating less as well as falling into debt. But the upshots of these food-related hazards are not short-term problems either. The affected population will have to bear the consequences for a very long period of time as they have no means to address the problems thus created and overcome those within a short while. The problem will but drag on until they have the income opportunity to repay their debt as well as overcome their nutritional deficiencies. But in the present circumstances that is but a pipe dream. To be brief, one can say that the socio-economic ramifications of food price hike are far wider and deeper than it may appear on the face of it. The UN survey has described this situation as 'silent emergency'. But the condition of the people hit by unprecedented rise in food price has other consequences that cannot be measured by only the figures found from research.
There are also millions people who have no fixed source of income; neither have they any family budget. No survey team ever reaches them. The condition of this section of the population can only be imagined. They will be in need of immediate government intervention to save their lives. In sum, the UN study report would require the government as well as the multilateral aid agencies to give a much closer attention to the issue of food price hike than it has received so far. Moreover, the problems the study in question has revealed, and which, understandably, are the outcomes of the spiralling prices of essentials, will also not disappear as soon as the prices go down after better harvests or food grains are imported from abroad. So, the government and its international development partners will also need to take into consideration the lasting damage that the price hike of foodstuff does to the families affected by it.