UN: World today has capacity
to end hunger, malnutrition
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| Campaign to end world hunger.- ANSA |
With the celebration of World Food Day on October 16, many
startling facts and figures surfaced regarding the state of food, hunger and
malnutrition in the world today.
By Robin Gomes
World Food Day is celebrated every year across the globe on
16 October, commemorating the day that the United Nations Food and Agriculture
Organization (FAO) was founded in 1945.
Established by the FAO in November 1979, the annual day is
observed widely by many other organizations concerned with food security,
including the World Food Programme (WFP) and the International Fund for
Agricultural Development (IFAD).
The theme of this year’s observance was "Our actions
are our future. A #ZeroHunger world by 2030 is possible".
The observance revealed many startling facts and figures
regarding the state of food, hunger and malnutrition in the world today.
Food waste
- WFP Executive Director David Beasley: rich nations
waste $750 billion of food each year, double the amount needed
to end global hunger, said on October 16.
- FAO: about a third of the world's food is lost or
thrown away each year, approximately 1.3 billion tonnes, worth nearly
$1 trillion.
- If current trends continue, food waste will rise to 2.1
billion tonnes annually by 2030.
- UN: almost half of all fruits, vegetables, roots and
tubers produced are wasted.
- Some 821 million people around the world were
hungry in 2017.
- Every year, consumers in rich countries waste almost
as much food - 222 million tonnes - as the entire net food production
of sub-Saharan Africa - 230 million tonnes.
- In developing countries, 40 percent of
losses occur post-harvest or during processing, while in industrialized
countries more than 40 percent of losses happen at retail
and consumer levels.
- Food waste squanders land and water used
to produce it, and also releases methane, a greenhouse gas,when left to
rot.
- U.S. consumers waste nearly 1 lb
(454 grams) of food per person each day - the equivalent of four
portions of chicken or a pint of blueberries.
- In Europe, 88 million tonnes of
food are wasted annually at a cost of 143 billion euros
($177 billion).
- In Britain, 15 billion pounds ($19.7 billion) worth
of edible food is binned every year, including the equivalent of 3 million
glasses of milk. (Compiled by Thomson Reuters)
Hunger, malnutrition
- The world produces enough food to feed everyone,
yet one person in nine suffers from chronic hunger.
- An estimated 815 million people suffered
from chronic hunger in 2016, according to FAO
figures.
- Roughly 60 percent of
the world’s hungry are women.
- About 80 percent of the world’s extreme
poor live in rural areas. Most of them depend on agriculture.
- Hunger kills more people every year than
malaria, tuberculosis and AIDS combined.
- Around 45 percent of infant deaths are
related to malnutrition. Stunting still affects
155 million children under the age of five years.
- 1.9 billion people – more than a quarter of
the world’s population – are overweight. 600 million of these are
obese and 3.4 million people die each year due to overweight.
- In many countries more people die from
obesity than from homicides.
- Malnutrition costs the global economy the equivalent
of USD 3.5 trillion a year.
- FAO estimates that agricultural production must
rise by about 60 percent by 2050 in order to feed a larger and
generally richer population. (Source: FAO)
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