Context: Growing global population and economic uncertainties have impacted the demand for calories. Improving the efficiency of calorie conversion provides solutions with certain challenges.
Issues pertaining to food security:
- Stresses Agriculture: Croplands constitute just 12% of the total land area and pastures another 25%, leaving limited scope for multi-cropping at scale
- Shift in diets: Steady growth in the human population and rising incomes have shifted diet towards more expensive calories like from fats which have a large land and freshwater footprint.
- Rise in global calorie demand: The demand rose 2% annually for nearly 5 decades since 1960 but fell to 1.5% over the past decade due to slowed population growth.
- Relationship with low GDP growth: Per capita calorie demand has stayed unchanged at 0.5 % over long periods.
- Demand for carbohydrate calories tends to stagnate at 1800 kcal/day per capita, for more calories, people must spend on expensive sources like meat, poultry, and fruits.
- Fall in GDP growth in 2019 impacted calorie consumption as people resorted to restricted meals or portion sizes. (Study conducted by Yale University in rural Nepal)
- New challenges: The current locust scare in east Africa and South Asia poses a threat to food security.
Factors strengthening Food Security
- Efficient Calorie Conversion:
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- Rising yields per hectare: Cereals are already in surplus; India is endowed with 12% of global cropland despite having only 2% of the global landmass.
- Acreage shifting to direct/indirect production of fats: Palm corn and soya have seen 86% of incremental acreage since 2000.
- Reduced Feed Conversion Ratio (the number of input calorie into livestock to get one edible output calorie): Due to rising industrialization and consolidation:
- The water use per tonne of meat is 40 to 60 % lower in industrial production than when produced through grazing or mixed farming.
- Sustainable Artificial Meat: It is the most efficient way of calorie conversion:
- 90% of lower greenhouse gas emissions
- 93-99% lower need for freshwater and land
- 46% less energy consumption than livestock-based meat.
- Reduced volatility in the trade of non-perishables: due to improved irrigation, strategic inventory reserves, and rising food trade.
- Reduced climate disruptions: The frequency of weather disasters has not risen since 2000.
Implications of Efficient Calorie conversion:
- Resumption of low food inflation: Improvement sin production was a major factor driving overall inflation down over the past decades.
- It is unlikely that the excess money supply would drive overall inflation through food consumption.
- Better margins for packaged food companies: which can hold on to prices even as the input costs fall.
- Less pressure on land: Increase in fat demand through meat would need an additional 10 million hectares of corn and Soya production by 2025.
Remaining Concern:
- Continued pressure on farmer’s income:
- Low inflation means low farm income.
- Protecting incomes through subsidies (20% of global GDP) may not suffice, and can cause socio-political challenges.