The Covid-19 pandemic could cause food security problems. In Low-Middle Income Countries(LMICs) but also globally. Warning and recommendations by Professor Qu Dongyu, director-general of theFood and Agriculture Organization (FAO).
Covid-19 and food security
The global crisis caused by the Covid-19 pandemic-which economists are already associating with the Great Recession of 2008-2009-exposes the world’s population to serious food security risks, i.e., essential supplies of the food necessary for life.
As early as 2019, FAO(Food and Agriculture Organization), WFP(World Food Program) and WHO(World Health Organization) reports censored by default:
– 821 million people afflicted with chronic malnutrition,
– 113 million affected by acute malnutrition,
– 143 million at risk of acute malnutrition.
Children and minors, as always, are the groups at greatest risk. Along with the elderly, disabled and women. The millions of children in many countries–in the Global South and beyond–who relied on school canteens for their only meal of the day have largely lost this essential garrison due to school closures. 1 in 4 children on the planet was, after all, listed by UNICEF as in need of humanitarian aid a few months before the pandemic, in late 2019, in the Humanitarian Action for Children 2020 appeal. (1)
Global food supply chains, what risks
The current risk is that of a sudden shortage of supplies, just as happened in the 2008-2009 crisis, according to experts at the Committee on World Food Security (CFS) at FAO. The measures to contain the contagion moreover, in establishing strict limits on the movement of people, risk putting seasonal agricultural production in crisis due to labor shortages. And logistics-even by sea, due to the partial closure of ports-suffers various obstacles. (2)
The global food supply chain is thus exposed to a risk of reduced supplies (and inventories) that could be reflected in price trends and as always affect LMIC countries dramatically. The availability of fresh and nutritious foods moreover, as noted above, is the basis for ensuring the effectiveness of the immune system. And so of the organism’s ability to resist the new coronavirus. (2)
The recommendations of the Committee on World Food Security (CFS, FAO).
An effective response to the real risk of a COVID-19-related food crisis requires examining how to restructure food systems nationally and globally, explains CFS President Thanawat Tiensin. The goal is to ensure political and financial stability, protect our communities from poor health and environmental degradation, and ensure economic vitality.
‘Like medical care, food must be able to cross borders freely. Food producers must ensure that healthy and nutritious food is available and not wasted’ (2).
The experience of the Great Recession (’08-’09) showed how governments-with the support of financial institutions, the UN and others-can mitigate the risk of global food shortages and high prices. Stimulus packages have stabilized the agricultural sector with programs to distribute seeds and various agricultural inputs, as well as subsidies for tractors and other machinery.
FAO director general’s warning
Qu Dongyu
, director-general of FAO, in turn stresses the need to ensure the continuity of food production and distribution chains. The governments of the 197 member states must work to ensure that agriculture does not lose efficiency and that farmworkers can work, while of course ensuring their safety.
Trade routes must be kept open to ensure the regularity of the global supply chain. Although a crisis such as this one leads each of us to concern ourselves primarily with the good of the country,” Professor Qu Dongyu cautions, “it is crucial to continue to look beyond national borders. And don’t lose sight of international cooperation. (3)
Ending hunger with agroecology
End hunger
. Ending world hunger, the FAO director-general reminds us, is the second of the Sustainable Development Goals in UN Agenda 2030. Ending hunger, that is, ensuring the food security of the planet, cannot be separated from the support of peasant and small- to medium-scale agriculture, among other things.
Agroecology is reaffirmed as a model to be promoted and supported, with concrete aid, in the five continents. We need to encourage the development of sustainable food production chains, rooted in each territory, for the sake of the environment and humanity.
Data and images documenting the food security problems now faced in various countries around the world are collected on Twitter by the @covidfood channel created by former FAO Director-General José Graziano Da Silva.
Dario Dongo and Alessandra Mei
Notes
(1) UNICEF (2019).
Humanitarian Action for Children
. V. https://www.egalite.org/unicef-azione-umanitaria-per-i-bambini-2020/
(2) T. Tiensin, A. Kalibata, M. Cole.
Ensuring Food Security in the Era of COVID 19
. Project Syndicate, 1.4.20, https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/covid19-threatens-to-unleash-global-food-insecurity-by-thanawat-tiensin-et-al-2020-03
(3) Qu Dongyu.
Coronavirus could worsen hunger in the developing world
. World Economic Forum, 10.4.20. https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/04/coronavirus-worsen-hunger-developing-world/
Dario Dongo, lawyer and journalist, PhD in international food law, founder of WIISE (FARE - GIFT - Food Times) and Égalité.
Graduated in Law from the University of Bologna, she attended the Master in Food Law at the same University. You participate in the WIISE srl benefit team by dedicating yourself to European and international research and innovation projects.
