World hunger situation: urgent need to rethink our agrifood systems

Following the launch of the 2022 edition of ‘The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World’ report, FAO Chief Economist Máximo Torero briefed journalists at the UN in New York.

Following the launch of the latest edition of ‘The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World’ (SOFI) report from UN headquarters, FAO Chief Economist, Máximo Torero, briefed journalists from New York at a press briefing organized by the Office of the Spokesperson of the Secretary-General. 

“The pandemic has increased existing inequalities, heightening the challenge of the eradication of hunger,” Torero said, adding that under a business-as-usual approach to fighting hunger, and without the agrifood systems transformation our world needs, FAO projections show that by 2030 we will have 670 million people still facing hunger.

A telling reality, as this would be exactly the same number of hungry people the world had in 2015 – adjusted for population growth – when the world agreed on the 2030 Agenda, including on SDG 2 for a world free of hunger.

The flagship report – a joint collaboration by FAO, IFAD, UNICEF, WFP and WHO – concludes that as many as 828 million people were chronically hungry in 2021, an increase of 150 million more hungry people since the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The report was launched in a special event of the High-level Political Forum on Sustainable Development (HLPF). It presents the latest hunger and malnutrition figures and makes the case for repurposing agricultural subsidies to deliver healthy diets produced by sustainable food systems.

Repurposing agricultural support and investments

The SOFI 2022 report notes that worldwide support for the food and agricultural sector averaged almost USD 630 billion a year, between 2013 and 2018. While most of this support is aimed at reaching individual farmers, through market policies and fiscal subsidies, much of it has been found to be market-distorting and, in fact, falling short of reaching many of those most in need. 

Some of these investment policies incentivize an unsustainable management of natural resources and do not promote the production of nutritious foods that make up a healthy diet – a clear global priority moving forward, given 3.1 billion people could not afford healthy diets in 2021.

“If you change the price incentives, you can have significant impacts in increasing the affordability of diets, and you would also have reductions of greenhouse gas emissions,” Torero outlined, stressing the viability of repurposed finance to safeguard our environment and improve affordability of nutritious foods.

Tapping into mutually beneficial efficiency gains to reduce hunger 

Against the backdrop of the many competing challenges of our time and their impact on the progress on SDG 2, reorienting the trend and adding velocity at which we are moving towards Zero Hunger is central. To this end, Torero laid out three priority efficiency gains on the road to 2030.

First, we need to prioritize countries facing the highest prevalence of, and vulnerability to, food insecurity, driven to a large extent by significant increases in their food import bills.

“We are talking of 62 countries, whose food import bill has increased by around USD 25.4 billion in 2022,” Torero said, pointing to the FAO proposal for a Global Food Import Financing Facility through the International Monetary Fund’s balance of payments support mechanism, to support countries in the face of soaring food import costs. Linked to this, he added, there is a need to diversify global sources of food and agricultural inputs, coupled with facilitating inter-regional trade.

Second, reducing food loss and waste is vital. With 14 percent of all food lost at the harvest, post-harvest, and supply chain levels, and 17 percent of all food wasted at the consumer level, potential solutions abound and need to be given due attention and finance to help increase the availability and affordability of food, while contributing to a smarter management of our limited resources.

Third, we need to use fertilizers and inputs in a more efficient manner. FAO is working to support countries in identifying soil and crop needs vis-à-vis fertilizer options and applicability, to ensure increased yields and a more input-efficient production, the Chief Economist explained.

“The goal is to accelerate the resilience-building process across three dimensions: early warning systems, shock absorptive capacity, and building back better by tapping into these efficiency gains,” he said. 

Related links

• Watch the recording of the global SOFI 2022 launch event and revisit the presentation by the FAO Chief Economist.
• Watch the recording of the press briefing from the UN in New York.
• Access the SOFI 2022 report and read the global press release.
• Follow @MaximoTorero on Twitter for more news and updates!