Closer to the target for eradicating world hunger : the scientific measurement of food deprivation and under-nutrition
Part of : Αρχείον οικονομικής ιστορίας ; Vol.XXIII, No.1, 2011, pages 89-115
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Pages:
89-115
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Abstract:
Food deprivation is synonymous with individual malnutrition. Food deprivation will ineviably occur if there is food shortage or food poverty, but deprivation also affects individuals in households whose food supply would be adequate were it distributed evenly. Extreme poverty remains a daily reality for more than 1 billion people who subsist on less than $1 a day. Hunger and malnutrition are almost equally pervasive: more than 800 million people have too little to eat to meet their daily energy needs. For young children, the lack of food can be perilous since it retards their physical and mental development and threatens their very survival. More than a quarter of children under age 5 in developing countries are malnourished. This paper aims to provide a broad account of the methodology for estimating the preva¬lence of undernourishment. Monitoring and measurement applied to the problem of food insecurity or, more specifically, food deprivation and undernutrition, serve the noble objective of counting and identifying those who are chronically or temporarily undernourished, malnourished, food insecure or vulnerable. The measure of food deprivation, which is referred to as the prevalence of undernourish¬ment, is based on a comparison of usual food consumption expressed in terms of dietary energy (kcal) with minimum energy requirement norms. The part of population with food consumption below the minimum energy requirement is considered underfed. But the rest of this report makes it equally clear that the lack of progress does not result from a lack of knowledge about what needs to be done. It is not that we have lost our way but rather than we have not followed it. We can escape from the vicious cycle in which hunger and poverty are perpetuated and we can enter a virtuous cycle, in which every investment in achieving one of our development goals accelerates progress towards reaching them all.
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Keywords:
child poverty, social exclusion, measurement of food deprivation, countries in transition.
Notes:
JEL classification: C200, I300, I320, Y100
