The Long Road to Food Security

Context: Despite being self-sufficient in agricultural production, India’s hunger levels are alarming.

Food security in India: an analysis

• Facts:
  • Global Hunger Index 2020 report: Ranked India 94^th among 107 countries, behind Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Nepal.
  • UN- Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) report: 194 million people go hungry every day in India, comprising about 23% of the world’s undernourished population.
  • The World Food Programme (WFP): Includes 60 grams of pulses in its typical food basket, alongside cereals, oils and sugar and salt
• Right to food: The Supreme Court declared Right to Food as part of Article 21 of the Constitution.
• Potential:
  • In 2018-19, India produced 283.37 million tons of food grains.
  • Ranks first in millets and second in rice and wheat production in the world. India’s horticultural crops, such as fruits and vegetables, are also in surplus (over 313 million tons in 2018-19).
• Associated concerns: Struggling ecosystem
  • Paradox of plenty: self-sufficiency in agricultural production, yet, mass hunger across States
  • Wastage of food grain: Almost 62,000 tons of food grains were damaged in Food Corporation of India warehouses between 2011 and 2017- data by Department of Consumer Affairs.
  • Poor management of the food ecosystem: while there is a proliferation of millions of ineligible and bogus ration cards, there are also, simultaneously, a multitude of genuinely poor families that do not even possess ration cards.

Way forward: Two-pronged policy is needed

1. Enhancing the purchasing power of farmers: Government must ensure remunerative prices for farm produce using the Minimum Support Price (MSP) as a tool.
2. Improving the Public Distribution System and Public Procurement:

• • Revamping the Annapurna yojana to cover more needy people (Presently, 10 kilograms of food grains are distributed per month free of cost to destitute persons above 65 years of age, with no or meagre subsistence.)
  • Include pulses in the Public Distribution System: Global Pulse Confederation, pulses are part of a healthy, balanced diet and have been shown to have an important role in preventing illnesses such as cancer, diabetes, and heart disease.