PERSPECTIVES IN WORLD FOOD AND

AGRICULTURE 2004

E DI T E D B Y

C OL I N G . S C A N E S

J OH N A . M I R A NOWSK I

PERSPECTIVES IN WORLD FOOD AND

AGRICULTURE 2004

PERSPECTIVES IN WORLD FOOD AND

AGRICULTURE 2004

E DI T E D B Y

C OL I N G . S C A N E S

J OH N A . M I R A NOWSK I

Colin G. Scanes is a Professor of Animal Science at Iowa State University. He was for-merly Executive Associate Dean of the College of Agriculture and founding Interim Di-rector of the Plant Sciences Institute at Iowa State University. He was educated in theUnited Kingdom with a B.Sc. from Hull University and Ph.D. from the University ofWales. He was formerly on the faculty at the University of Leeds and Rutgers—TheState University of New Jersey, where he was department chair. He has published exten-sively with more than 10 books and 500 papers. He has received numerous awards, in-cluding Honorary Professor at the Agricultural University of Ukraine.

John A. Miranowski holds both an A.M. and a Ph.D. in Economics from HarvardUniversity and a B.S. from Iowa State University. He is presently a Professor of Agricul-tural Economics at Iowa State University. He was formerly Director, Resources andTechnology Division at the USDA’s Economic Research Service and Executive Coordina-tor of the Secretary of Agriculture’s Policy Coordination Council, Special Assistant tothe Deputy Secretary of Agriculture, and Head of the Department of Economics at IowaState University.

“The State of World Food Security” © Food and Agriculture Organization of the UnitedNations, used with permission.

© 2004 Iowa State PressA Blackwell Publishing CompanyAll rights reserved

Iowa State Press2121 State Avenue, Ames, Iowa 50014

Orders: 1—800—862—6657Office: 1—515—292—0140Fax: 1—515—292—3348Web site: www.iowastatepress.com

Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use, or the internal or personal use of specific clients, is granted by Iowa State Press, provided that the base fee of $.10 per copy is paid directly to the Copyright Clearance Center, 222 RosewoodDrive, Danvers, MA 01923. For those organizations that have been granted a photocopy license by CCC, a separate system of payments has been arranged. The feecode for users of the Transactional Reporting Service is 0—8138—2021—9/2004 $.10.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Perspectives in world food and agriculture, 2004 / edited by Colin G.Scanes and John A. Miranowski

p. cm.ISBN 0-8138-2021-9 (alk. paper)1. Agriculture. 2. Food supply. 3. Agriculture and state. I.

Scanes, C. G. II. Miranowski, J. A.S439.P44 2003338.1'8—dc21

2003009569

The last digit is the print number: 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

This book is dedicated to

Dr. Norman E. BorlaugScientist,

Agriculturalist,Humanitarian,

Father of the green revolution,Nobel Peace Prize Laureate,

Founder of the World Food Prize

Dr. Norman E. Borlaug (center) meeting the editors, John Miranowski (left) and ColinScanes (right) at the Iowa capitol building at the announcement of Norman Borlaug Dayin 2002.

Contents

ForewordKenneth M. Quinn xi

Preface xiii

Acknowledgments xvii

Section I Frontiers in World Food 1

1 The State of World Food SecurityFood and Agrigculture Organization of the United Nations 3

2 Feeding a World of 10 Billion People: Our 21st Century ChallengeNorman E. Borlaug 31

3 Dr. Norman E. Borlaug: 20th Century Lessons for the 21st Century WorldKenneth M. Quinn 57

4 An Appeal by the 15 World Food Prize Laureates on the Occasion of the World Food Summit: Five Years Later 71

5 Reducing Hunger by Improving Soil Fertility: An African Success StoryPedro A. Sanchez 75

6 Achieving the 2020 Vision in the Shadow of International TerrorismPer Pinstrup-Andersen 87

Section II Frontiers in Food 99

7 HACCP as a Model for Improving Food SafetyCatherine E. Woteki, Margaret O’K. Glavin, and Brian D. Kineman 101

vii

8 Leading Changes in Food Retailing: Seven Steps to a Demand-Driven Food SystemJean D. Kinsey 119

Section III Frontiers in Animal Agriculture 135

9 The Importance of Livestock for the World’s PoorR. R. von Kaufmann and Hank Fitzhugh 137

10 Agricultural and Environmental Issues in theManagement of Animal ManuresH. H. Van Horn and W. J. Powers 161

11 The Equine Industry—Economicand Societal ImpactKaryn Malinowski and Norman Luba 187

Section IV Frontiers in Water 205

12 Managing Water InsecurityJacques Diouf 207

13 Neither Water nor Food Security Without a Major Shift in Thinking—A Water-Scarcity Close-UpM. Falkenmark and J. Rockström 211

14 Major Problems in the Global Water-Food NexusDavid Seckler and Upali Amarasinghe 227

15 Water Scarcity: From Problems to Opportunities in the Middle EastMona Mostafa El Kady 253

16 The Role of Biosaline Agriculture in Managing Freshwater Shortages and Improving Water SecurityMohammad Al-Attar 271

17 Coping with Water Scarcity in Dry Areas: Challenges and OptionsAdel El-Beltagy and Theib Oweis 283

viii Contents

18 An Integrated Approach for Efficient Water Use—Case Study: IsraelSaul Arlosoroff 297

19 The Mekong River Basin—Searching forTransboundary Water Allocation RulesClaudia Ringler 313

20 Jal Swaraj: A Win-Win Situation for AllM. S. Swaminathan 315

Section V Frontiers in Policy and Ethics 321

21 China’s Grain Security and Trade Policies After Entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO): Issues and OptionsZuhui Huang, Jianzhang You, and Jiaan Cheng 323

22 The Legacy of Positivism and the Role of Ethics in the Agricultural SciencesPaul B. Thompson 335

23 Agroterrorism: Need for AwarenessRadford G. Davis 353

24 Agricultural Biotechnology in Developing CountriesGreg Graff, Matin Qaim, Cherisa Yarkin, and David Zilberman 417

Section VI Statistics and Trends in World Agriculture 439

25 Factors Affecting World Agriculture B. Babcock, J. Fabiosa, H. Matthey, M. Isik, S. Tokgoz, A. El Obeid, S. Meyer, F. Fuller, C. Hart, A. Saak and K. Kovarik 441

Index 457

Contents ix

Foreword

The partnership between the World Food Prize and the series editorswas born of a conversation at the World Food Prize Foundation head-quarters in Des Moines in 2001.

At that time, Colin Scanes and John Miranowski told me of their vi-sion for a volume that would fill the void they saw at the nexus of re-search and public policy on food and agriculture. They explained thattheir plan was to design an annual publication with contemporary rele-vance, but one which would also serve as an historical archive to tracethe statistical changes in key measurements of both the food supply andhuman needs and deprivation.

The editors’ vision for their publication fit well with the World FoodPrize’s search, at the time, for an effective vehicle that could disseminatethe rich and diverse presentations made each October at its Interna-tional Symposium held in Des Moines near or on World Food Day. Atthe turn of the 21st century, food and agricultural policy had been thrustonto the main agenda of the international political system. Yet, few in-ternational actors were well versed in the essential details of food pro-duction or the extent of human suffering possible as the world’spopulation expands in the coming decades. Moreover, the linkages ofpoverty eradication to countering terrorism were only beginning to be-come apparent. I sensed an incipient partnership.

Founded by Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Dr. Norman E. Borlaug, theWorld Food Prize prides itself on bringing together global experts, pol-icymakers, academic specialists, and business leaders to address cuttingedge issues at the intersection of agricultural development, human de-privation, and international security. Topics recently explored at theWorld Food Prize International Symposium often were harbingers of is-sues that later became center stage in global diplomatic forums, and atthe heart of regional disputes. Those topics included: the role of geneti-cally modified crops in feeding developing countries (2000); the impactof HIV/AIDS on food production in Africa (2001); the threat of agro-terrorism (2001); global water insecurity and its implications for peace

xi

in the Middle East (2002); and the essential role of the United Nationsin implementing the Millennium Development Goals (2003). The Scanesand Miranowski volume seemed the perfect vehicle to distribute andpreserve the research and insights of the experts we had assembled toaddress these issues.

In addition to containing the papers given at our symposium, this an-nual publication could also incorporate the address given by our WorldFood Prize Laureate following the presentation of our $250,000 prize,providing a continuum of rich overviews of the major challenges facingour planet in the struggle to ensure adequate food for all in the 21st cen-tury.

This rich trove of information, commentary, and prescriptions forchange has been available to only those in attendance at our symposia—until now. With the publication of Dr. Scanes’s and Dr. Miranowski’sfirst volume, in what assuredly will be a long and distinguished series,the insights and analyses of the leading figures on the frontiers of feed-ing the hungry will now be available around the world. Of particularsignificance is the inclusion of Norman Borlaug’s tour d’horizon onfeeding a world of 10 billion people, given on October 21, 2003 at IowaState University, where both editors hold distinguished faculty positions.

Fifty years from now, a student somewhere in the world may pick upthis volume and read the analysis by and dictums of Dr. Borlaug—theindividual credited with saving more lives than any other person whohas ever lived. And, motivated by this Nobel Laureate’s words, maybe,just maybe, this student will be inspired to try to achieve a similar sci-entific breakthrough that will result in feeding the world’s burgeoningpopulation.

If that does occur, it will be because Dr. Borlaug’s summa agriculturalecture has been preserved thanks to the initiative of Colin Scanes andJohn Miranowski, who had the vision to create this series, and the fore-sight of Iowa State Press and Blackwell Publishing, who made it a real-ity. The World Food Prize is proud to be a partner with them in thisendeavor.

Kenneth M. QuinnAmbassador (ret.)

President, The World Food Prize

xii Foreword

xiii

Preface

Perspectives in World Food and Agriculture: 2004 has as its goal bring-ing together essays and reviews on frontiers in the food system, agricul-tural research, and agricultural policy in North America, Europe, and thedeveloping world, together with a summary of statistical data on worldagriculture. The volume is a partnership with the World Food Prize, andwe are delighted to include the World Food Prize logo on the cover.

The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) esti-mates that there are over 800 million people in the world who are un-dernourished (covered in detail in chapter 1). Food security throughoutthe world is a moral imperative, such that all people receive sufficientcalories, protein, vitamins, and minerals (macro- and trace) for not onlythe absence of hunger but also productive and healthy lives. Lack offood violates human rights and is both a cause and effect of poverty.Moreover, there is considerable potential for regional conflicts over foodand water and links between endemic poverty and terrorism. In this in-creasingly interdependent global environment, overcoming hunger andpoverty is critical on ethical grounds; enlightened self-interest from thedeveloping world is also imperative.

Agriculture represents a crucial mechanism for reducing poverty andstimulating economic activity while protecting the environment. In theUnited States, food production/processing represents �16 percent of theGNP. In many developing countries, food and agriculture representmore than 50 percent of the GNP, and more than half the populationlives in rural areas. The movement to cities (driven by economic con-siderations) represents twin challenges for food and water security to theurban dwellers and to enhancing rural economic development. Policy-makers in multinational and national governmental and nongovern-mental development agencies are recognizing, rediscovering, orreinvigorating the importance of food, agriculture, and water.

This volume is divided into the following sections:

Section I Frontiers in World FoodSection II Frontiers in Food

xiv Preface

Section III Frontiers in Animal AgricultureSection IV Frontiers in WaterSection V Frontiers in Policy and EthicsSection VI Statistics and Trends in World Agriculture

Each section consists of a series of invited essays or reviews and is in-troduced by a contextual statement.

“Frontiers in World Food” considers the world food situation withexamples of successful science-based approaches. The impact of theWorld Food Prize and its laureates is stressed—individuals can and havemade the difference. Norman E. Borlaug received the Nobel Peace Prizeas the father of the “green revolution,” which has done so much to re-duce hunger, particularly in Asia. He has contributed an essay on thechallenge of feeding a world population of 10 billion people. The sec-tion also contains a biography of Dr. Borlaug by Ambassador KennethQuinn. Also included is a review by Pedro Sanchez (winner of the 2002World Food Prize) on a success story in agricultural research and devel-opment in the developing world. This is based on the recognition of thedeclining fertility of African soils and includes a successful approach toovercome this problem.

“Frontiers in Food” considers the issues of food safety and market-ing in the U.S.

“Frontiers in Animal Agriculture” considers livestock as a means toreduce poverty in developing countries, the impact of horses for ruraleconomic development in North America, and the thorny issue of ani-mal waste, which affects agricultural producers, neighbors, and thephysical environment (potentially contaminating air, water, and soil).

“Frontiers in Water” is based on the 2002 World Food Prize sympo-sium. Lack of adequate supplies of high-quality water, particularly in theMiddle East, represents an obstacle to development and the alleviationof hunger and poverty and a source of friction between countries.

“Frontiers in Policy and Ethics” includes an essay on the ethics offood and agriculture by Paul Thompson together with a perspective onthe effects of China’s accession to the World Trade Organization and anextensive discussion of agroterrorism. The issue of agricultural biotech-nology in developing countries is addressed by a cutting edge review byDavid Zilberman and his colleagues.

“Statistics and Trends in World Agriculture” provides statistical in-formation on trends in agriculture and hence factors that affect worldagriculture.

Preface xv

It is hoped that this volume will be useful to a diverse readership,from policymakers (national and international), to officials and admin-istrators (government, nongovernment organizations, universities, andresearch institutions), to farmer/commodity organizations, to agricul-tural leaders, to agricultural-related businesses, to agricultural scientists(universities, research institutes, and industry), to agricultural educators,to undergraduate and graduate students of agriculture (particularly inperspectives/capstone courses), and to the general public interested infood and agricultural issues. It is anticipated that this volume will be thefirst of a series.

xvii

Acknowledgments

The editors of this volume are indebted to the Advisory Council mem-bers for their invaluable assistance. The Advisory Council consists of agroup of eminent agriculturists and agricultural researchers from acrossthe World, and is comprised of the following individuals:

Dr. Ronald Cantrell, Director-General, International Rice Research In-stitute. Dr. Cantrell is a prominent plant scientist. He is presently Di-rector-General, International Rice Research Institute. He was formerlyHead of Agronomy at Iowa State University and with the wheat andmaize breeding center, CIMMYT.

Dr. Jiaan Cheng, Vice President, Zhejiang University, China. Dr. Chengis the President Elect for the International Consortium of AgriculturalUniversities.

Dr. Csaba Csaki, World Bank. Dr. Csaki is a prominent agriculturaleconomist. He is presently with World Bank.

Dr. Eddy Decuypere, Katholieke Universiteit, Leuven, Belgium. Dr. De-cuypere is a prominent animal scientist.

Dr. Ralph Hardy, National Agricultural Biotechnology Council, U.S.A.Dr. Hardy is a prominent plant scientist. He is presently President of theNational Agricultural Biotechnology Council and was formerly VicePresident of Research for DuPont.

Dr. Stanley Johnson, Iowa State University, U.S.A. Dr. Johnson is aprominent agricultural economist. He is presently Vice Provost for Ex-tension at Iowa State University. He was formerly Director of ISU’s Cen-ter of Agricultural Research and Development.

Dr. Dmytro Melnychuk, Rector, National Agricultural University,Ukraine. Dr. Melnychuk is Rector of the Agricultural University ofUkraine and an Academician of the Ukrainian Academy of AgriculturalScience. He is President of the Global Consortium of Higher Educationand Research for Agriculture.

xviii Acknowledgments

Dr. Susan Offutt, USDA Economic Research Service. Dr. Offut is aprominent agricultural economist. She is presently Administrator ofUSDA’s Economic Research Service.

Dr. Rajendra Singh Paroda, CGIAR. Dr. Paroda was formerly Director-General of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research.

Dr. Per Pinstrip-Andersen, Director-General, International Food PolicyResearch Institute. Dr. Pinstrip-Andersen is a prominent agricultural econ-omist. Until recently, he was Director-General of the International FoodPolicy Research Institute. In 2001, he received the World Food Prize.

Dr. Kenneth Quinn, World Food Prize. Dr. Quinn heads The WorldFood Prize Foundation. He was with the U.S. State Department and wasformerly U.S. Ambassador to Cambodia.

Dr. Timothy Reeves, Director-General, CIMMYT. Dr Reeves is a promi-nent agronomist focusing on sustainable agriculture. He was until re-cently Director-General of the International Center for maize/corn andwheat breeding (CIMMYT).

Dr. Ismail Seragelden, President, Alexandria Library, Egypt. Dr. Ser-agelden, an economist, was formerly Vice President of the World Bankand is presently President of the Alexandria Library, Egypt.

IFrontiers in World Food

This section includes a series of essays and reviews on the world foodsituation. This critical topic is introduced by an overview from theUnited Nation Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). The volumeis dedicated to Norman E. Borlaug. He is not only a great agriculturist,father of the green revolution, and Nobel Peace Prize winner but alsofounder of The World Food Prize. We are delighted that Norman Bor-laug has contributed a seminal essay on feeding a world of 10 billionpeople. In addition, Kenneth Quinn, president of the World Food Prizefoundation, has contributed a definitive short biography of Dr. Borlaug.The link with The World Food Prize is further emphasized by the pub-lication of the list of past laureates, their statement for the World FoodSummit and reviews by laureates, including 2002 laureate PedroSanchez and 2001 laureate Per Pinstrup-Andersen.

1 The State of World Food SecurityFood and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations

2 Feeding a World of 10 Billion People: Our 21st CenturyChallenge

Norman E. Borlaug3 Dr. Norman E. Borlaug: 20th Century Lessons for the 21st

Century WorldKenneth M. Quinn

4 An Appeal by the 15 World Food Prize Laureates on the Occasionof the World Food Summit: Five Years Later

5 Reducing Hunger by Improving Soil Fertility: An African SuccessStory

Pedro A. Sanchez6 Achieving the 2020 Vision in the Shadow of International

TerrorismPer Pinstrup-Andersen

1

3

1The State of World Food Security

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations

The state of world food security reflects a stark dichotomy betweenabundance and deprivation. The world produces enough food to pro-vide everyone with an adequate diet; information systems can pinpointwhere food is needed; modern transport systems can move food aroundthe globe rapidly; yet nearly one person in seven cannot produce or buyenough food to sustain an active and healthy life. While obesity has be-come one of the fastest rising health problems in both developed and de-veloping countries, 840 million people do not have enough to eat.

Millions of people, including 6 million children under the age of five,die each year as a result of hunger and malnutrition. Of these millions,relatively few are the victims of famines. Far more die unnoticed, killedby the effects of chronic hunger and malnutrition that leave them weak,underweight, and vulnerable. Health and mortality indicators areclosely correlated with the prevalence of hunger. Common childhooddiseases are far more likely to be fatal in children who are even mildlyundernourished, and the risk increases sharply with the severity of mal-nutrition. Eliminating hunger and malnutrition could save millions oflives each year (FAO 2002).

Poverty reduction has been the center of the development effort in thelast decade, and the lessons learned demonstrate that only purposefulaction will alleviate poverty. Poverty is a cause of hunger, but hunger canalso be a cause of poverty. Hunger in childhood impairs mental as wellas physical growth, impacting negatively on productive capacity inadulthood. People who are chronically undernourished cannot work attheir highest potential, and they tend to have lower earnings and shorterworking lives. FAO estimates that reducing the number of undernour-ished people by half by 2015 would yield a value of more than $US120billion in terms of longer and healthier lives.

Heads of state and government representing 186 countries met at theWorld Food Summit (WFS) in Rome in 1996 and affirmed their “com-mon and national commitment to achieving food security for all” and

4 I / Frontiers in World Food

Figure 1.1 The number of undernourished in the developing world—observed andprojected ranges compared with the World Food Summit target.

agreed to work toward the achievement of the intermediate goal of “re-ducing the number of undernourished people to half their present num-ber no later than 2015.”

They reconvened in June 2002 at the WFS five years later to reaffirmthis pledge, which was also echoed in the Millennium DevelopmentGoals. It is already clear, however, that these targets cannot be met un-less purposeful action is taken.

Rapid progress in cutting the incidence of chronic hunger in devel-oping countries is possible if political will is mobilized (see Figure 1.1).FAO believes that an international alliance against hunger is required tolaunch a coordinated and sustained effort at all levels—international, re-gional, national, and local—to generate the political will and mobilizethe necessary resources for this battle.

A successful anti-hunger program must address the problem on twotracks. The first track stresses action to relieve hunger through direct as-sistance to the poor. The second track stresses the importance of en-hancing access to food by the poor. The two tracks are mutuallyreinforcing. Programs to enhance direct and immediate access to food

1 / The State of World Food Security 5

offer new outlets for expanded production. Countries that have fol-lowed this approach are seeing the benefits.

The purpose of this chapter is to achieve the following:

• Present the status of, and trends in, the food security situation in theworld

• Explore the relationship between undernourishment and poverty• Point to important directions that are necessary for hunger eradica-

tion and poverty alleviation

THE CURRENT DIMENSIONS OF FOOD INSECURITY

Food security is the “physical and economic access by all people, at alltimes, to sufficient, nutritionally adequate, and safe food for an activeand healthy life.” This definition implies that the mere presence of fooddoes not guarantee that it is accessible to a person, since that personmust also have the resources necessary to obtain access to food. How se-rious is the problem of food insecurity in the world today?

CHRONIC HUNGER AND MALNUTRITION

According to FAO’s latest estimates, there were 840 million undernour-ished people1 in the world in 1998—2000: 799 million in developingcountries, 30 million in countries in transition, and 11 million in devel-oped market economies. More than half of the undernourished (508million people, 60 percent of the total) live in Asia and the Pacific, whilesub-Saharan Africa accounts for almost a quarter (196 million people;23 percent of the total)(see Figure 1.2).

The prevalence of undernourishment differs markedly by region.Sub-Saharan Africa has the highest prevalence, at 33 percent of the pop-ulation. The second highest is found in Asia and the Pacific, where 16percent of the population is undernourished. This regional aggregatedisguises important subregional differences; in South Asia, 24 percent ofthe population is undernourished, and in East and Southeast Asia, theproportion is 10 and 12 percent, respectively. For the Near East andNorth Africa, the prevalence of undernourishment is 10 percent, and forLatin America and the Caribbean it is 11 percent (see Figure 1.3).

The prevalence of undernourishment in developing countries hasfallen from 28 percent of the total population in 1979—81 to 17 percent

6 I / Frontiers in World Food

Figure 1.2 Undernourished population (in millions) by region, 1998—2000 (FAO).

Figure 1.3 Percentage of undernourished in total population by region, 1979—81,1990—92, 1998—2000 (FAO).

in 1998—2000 (see Figure 1.3). This is significant progress. However, ithas been uneven and has slowed in recent years. In Asia and the Pacific,the prevalence has been halved since 1979—81, with the most rapid

1 / The State of World Food Security 7

progress occurring in East Asia. In sub-Saharan Africa the incidence ofundernourishment has been falling slightly since 1979—81, althoughwith population growth the absolute number of undernourished hascontinued to rise. In Latin America and the Caribbean, the incidence ofundernourishment has fallen marginally in the 1990s, from a low base.In the Near East and North Africa, marginal progress in the 1980s wasoffset by a slight deterioration during the 1990s, so both the prevalenceand the absolute number of undernourished have increased, also from alow base.

Table 1.1 presents three additional indicators of nutritional status:the share of starchy foods (cereals, roots, and tubers) in the overall diet,life expectancy at birth, and under-five mortality rates. The last two in-dicators measure aspects of a more complex state of human well-being,including nutritional status. To allow a better understanding of trends,Table 1.1 also gives these figures for 1990—92.

The share of the total diet derived from starchy foods is an indicatorof variety and quality of the average diet of a population. A satisfactorydiet can be had with starchy staples ranging anywhere between 55—75percent of total dietary energy supply (DES), and diet composition canthus vary considerably from season to season and from culture to cul-ture, without detrimental effect on nutritional status. Nevertheless,starchy staples in excess of 70—75 percent of total DES is cause for con-cern because there is a positive correlation between this indicator andthe number of undernourished. Moreover it is indicative of insufficientnutritional diversity and a deficiency of micronutrients needed for ahealthy diet. Note that the figures in Table 1.1 refer to the average diet,so it is likely that the food-insecure people within these populations aremore heavily dependent on starchy staples than the average consumer.

In the developing world, in 1998—2000, the share of cereals, roots,and tubers in total energy was around 63 percent, down very slightlyfrom 1990—92. In most of the developing regions, not only was thisshare high to begin with, but there was no evidence of any decline, in-dicating that diets had not diversified to any great extent. The only ex-ceptions were East and South East Asia, where this share went down 7percentage points, and Latin America and the Caribbean where theshare was low to begin with, at 45 percent. Everywhere else this shareremains above 60 percent and is higher in several individual countries.It is, in fact, 70 percent or more in 15 countries in sub-Saharan Africa,5 countries in Southeast Asia, and 2 countries in South Asia.

8

Table 1.1. Food security indicators by developing region and time periodEast & Latin Near East All

Southeast America & & North South Sub-Saharan Developing Region Asia Caribbean Africa Asia Africa RegionsNumber undernourished (millions)

1990—92 292 59 26 276 166 8181998—2000 193 55 40 315 196 799

Percentage undernourished1990—92 16 13 8 26 35 201998—2000 10 11 10 24 33 17

DES (Kcal/day/person)1990—92 2656 2710 3010 2330 2120 25401998—2000 2930 2820 2940 2390 2210 2670

Share of starchy food in total DES (percentage)1990—92 74 45 62 68 70 671998—2000 67 44 61 65 69 63

Life expectancy at birth in years, female/male1990—92 69/66 71/65 66/64 60/59 52/49 65/621

1996—98 71/67 73/67 69/66 63/62 52/49 67/63Under-five mortality rate, per 1,000

1990—92 55 49 72 121 155 911

2000 45 37 54 96 162 84Source: FAO Statistics, World Bank World Development Indicators, 2000 and 2002.1Average for low and middle-income countries (World Bank definition).

1 / The State of World Food Security 9

Turning now to indicators of general health, we find that except insub-Saharan Africa, there has been a general improvement in both fe-male and male life expectancy between 1990—92 and 1996—98. By thelatter period, the regions with the highest female and male life ex-pectancies were Latin America and the Caribbean and East and SouthEast Asia respectively, which were quite close to the OECD averages of81 and 75 for that period. Life expectancy is lowest in countries withthe highest prevalence of undernourishment, also because undernour-ishment shortens lives through increased susceptibility to illness. In ad-dition, there are thirty-two countries that have seen life expectancydecline since 1990. Most are countries hit by the AIDS epidemic. Ninecountries lost more than three years of life expectancy: Botswana(�10.7), Zambia (�6.6), Kenya (�6.1), Zimbabwe (�5.2), Uganda(�4.3), Kazakhstan (�3.7), Côte d’Ivoire (�3.7), Central African Re-public (�3.2), and Namibia (�3.1).

The mortality rate for newborn infants is also an indicator of the nu-tritional status of their mothers, while those for children under five aresuggestive of the nutritional status of the children themselves. It is nowrecognized that 6 million out of 11 million deaths among children underfive—or 55 percent of young child mortality in developing countries—are associated with malnutrition. Though mortality rates in children un-der five fell in all regions except sub-Saharan Africa, they are decliningtoo slowly to attain the Millennium Development Goal of a two-thirdsreduction by 2015: rates should have come down by roughly 30 percentin the 1990s, but they declined by only 8 percent. Between 1990 and2000, 17 developing countries reduced their under-five mortality ratefast enough to meet the Millennium Development Goal. But over thesame period, 14 countries experienced worsening rates, among them theDemocratic Peoples Republic of Korea, where the child mortality rate in-creased from 35 to 90, and Zimbabwe, where it went from 76 to 116 per1,000. By 2000, even in the region with the lowest under-five mortalityrate in the developing world, Latin America and the Caribbean, this ratewas still around 37 per thousand. This was enormously higher than theaverage for the OECD countries, which was about 6 per thousand.

FOOD SHORTAGE EMERGENCIES2

As noted above, these stark data on undernourishment and deprivationdo not reflect a global scarcity of food. Quite to the contrary, world

10 I / Frontiers in World Food

prices for basic foodstuffs have declined 38 percent since 1996, sug-gesting there is no shortage of food at the global level. Although thatyear marked a “spike” in global cereals prices, longer-term trends indi-cate that world prices have been declining steadily.3

In any given year, however, between 5 and 10 percent of the totalnumber of undernourished in the world can be traced to specific events:droughts; floods; armed conflict; and social, political, and economic dis-ruptions. Frequently, these shocks strike countries already sufferingfrom endemic poverty and struggling to recover from earlier natural andmanmade disasters. Often, transitory food insecurity transforms intochronic food insecurity as people’s assets and savings are wiped out.

Globally, 31 countries were experiencing severe food shortages andrequired international food assistance as of August 2002. An estimated67 million people required emergency food aid as a result of theseshocks. Both the number of countries and people affected remained al-most identical to the figures from a year earlier, as did the causes and lo-cations of these food emergencies. As in previous years, drought andconflict were the most common causes of emergencies and Africa wasthe most affected region.

In southern Africa, nearly 13 million people need emergency foodaid. A combination of droughts, floods, and economic dislocations re-duced harvests in several countries to half or less than their normal lev-els. In Zimbabwe—until recently an exporter of maize—bad weather,political conflict, and economic problems have combined to cripple pro-duction. Maize production has fallen sharply in several countries, andprices have risen by as much as 400 percent, seriously undermining ac-cess to food for large sections of the population.

In eastern Africa, the food outlook is bleak in several countries due topoor seasonal rains. In Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Kenya a combined figureof 10.3 million people are in need of food assistance due to drought orpoor rains. In Somalia, despite a favorable forecast for the main seasoncrops, serious malnutrition rates are reported, reflecting successivedroughts and long-term insecurity. The escalation of conflict in northernUganda has displaced large numbers of people, adding to the more than1.5 million internally displaced persons, refugees, and other vulnerablepeople that already depend on food assistance.

In western Africa, dry weather has seriously affected crops, particu-larly in The Gambia, Guinea-Bissau, Mauritania, and Senegal. In CapeVerde, prospects for the maize crop, normally planted from July, are un-favorable due to delayed onset of rains. By contrast, crop-growing con-