Unlocking the potential of rural areas is key to reducing world hunger
By Vincent Martin |
Updated: 2018-11-23 17:14
Editor's note: This article is part of the Policy Preview Report for G20 Summit in Argentina.
Vincent Martin
The challenges to ensure food and nutrition security for all in a contemporary world are complex and intertwined with a broad range of global political, financial and social development issues. Great progress has been made through the centuries in transforming our agricultural systems and this created the conditions needed to feed a growing world population. The results are evident. Today, we live longer, we are healthier and more people than ever before in history have access to food, in both quantity and quality.
However, as reported in the State of Food Security and Nutrition released by FAO and four other UN agencies in October 2018, the number of people suffering from hunger remains unacceptably high and has been on the increase for the third year in a row reaching 821 million people. After years of advances in fighting in hunger, we have returned to levels of undernourishment that we witnessed a decade ago. Worse still is that today, multiple forms of malnutrition co-exist and obesity is on the rise worldwide, affecting 13.3 percent of the global adult population. If the trend continues, the number of people who are overweight or obese will surpass the number of undernourished people in the world.
Meanwhile, a staggering amount of food is lost or wasted every year representing one-third of the food we produce, equivalent to 1.3 billion tons of food each year that ultimately does not reach our plates. In developing countries, the situation is aggravated by poor infrastructure and facilities for storage, processing, packaging and marketing. The implication is not only on the availability of food supplies but also on its enormous environmental footprint, generating annually about eight percent of total anthropogenic Green House Gas emissions. These, in turn, will take their own toll on agriculture and our efforts to feed today’s hungry and the additional two billion people we will need to feed by the middle of this century.
The question we need to ask ourselves is how much time is left to get back on track for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals, especially SDG-2 which aims to eradicate hunger and all forms of malnutrition by 2030?
To address these challenges, we need a new way of thinking because the approaches we’ve become accustomed to through the centuries and in recent decades may no longer be as effective to help feed the population of tomorrow.
In search of alternatives, the focus must be on policy making – one that decisively shifts to more inclusive solutions that foster investment in rural areas, which remains central to the global objective of ending hunger by 2030. In doing so, there is scope for creating job opportunities, preserving our landscapes and cultures, limiting ill-prepared migration, fighting climate change and ultimately feeding the world. A rural focus is indeed critical as approximately 80 percent of the extreme poor today are living in these areas – and they are the most food insecure of all. The untapped potential of women in rural areas of many countries – giving them equal access to credit and land for example – would too be a huge help in producing more food with existing human resources.
For far too long, and in general, rural areas have been seen as poverty traps, but they can be dynamic and a source of social innovation. Transforming food systems through rural development strategies and sustainable, climate resilient agriculture practices are central to this process and can unlock their potential. As such, rural towns and secondary cities can play a crucial role in structural and rural transformation by strengthening rural-urban linkages, creating higher demand for goods, services and food, helping to develop territorial markets (short circuits) and inclusive value chain models while generating employment that leads to poverty reduction (the FAO State of Food and Agriculture 2017).
However, policies targeting investment in rural areas alone are not sufficient and must go along with a “whole food system” approach, building on everyone’s participation and better individual choices, including on the way we consume food. We also need more solidarity at local, regional and global levels. In a globalized world, cooperation between countries is indeed becoming increasingly important to deliver international public goods and turning into an SDG mindset. As such, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) launched by China, and its agriculture development component, has the potential to influence the food systems locally, regionally or globally and bring development and market opportunities to remote areas which have largely failed to benefit from the expansion of global trade for the last four decades.
However, to achieve effective rural development and alleviate poverty, BRI infrastructure investments are a “necessary but insufficient” condition. The impact of infrastructure investments on rural poverty and food security will depend on many different factors. Well-designed measures, that benefit both women and men, and complement infrastructure investments, are necessary to ensure that poverty alleviation, food security and pro-poor outcomes can be achieved. Private sector investment in activities such as agricultural production, logistics, storage and processing, are also encouraged and will be key to achieving the above-mentioned goals. To ensure that private agricultural investments benefit local communities and promote rural development, efforts should be made to ensure the investments and business models adopted use an inclusive and sustainable framework. This will benefit both investors and local communities, by applying international standards such as the CFS-Principles for Responsible Investment in Agriculture and Food Systems, the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests in the Context of National Food Security, and the OECD-FAO Guidance on Responsible Agricultural Supply Chains.
If there is no one-size-fits-all solution for solving such a complex global issue, there are reasons for hope and opportunities are emerging to unlock the potential of rural areas to meet the needs of many. Initiatives are flourishing around the world in this area, paving the way for more sustainable and inclusive food systems. From local to global, such initiatives must be connected and scaled up, supported by public policy and stimulated by private investment, if we are to have any chance of achieving the SDGs by 2030. If implemented successfully, such approaches can create the conditions to sustainably feed a growing population and fight poverty at the same time.
Vincent Martin is UNFAO Representative in China and DPR Korea. The author contributed this article to China Watch exclusively. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of China Watch.
All rights reserved. Copying or sharing of any content for other than personal use is prohibited without prior written permission.
Editor's note: This article is part of the Policy Preview Report for G20 Summit in Argentina.
Vincent Martin
The challenges to ensure food and nutrition security for all in a contemporary world are complex and intertwined with a broad range of global political, financial and social development issues. Great progress has been made through the centuries in transforming our agricultural systems and this created the conditions needed to feed a growing world population. The results are evident. Today, we live longer, we are healthier and more people than ever before in history have access to food, in both quantity and quality.
However, as reported in the State of Food Security and Nutrition released by FAO and four other UN agencies in October 2018, the number of people suffering from hunger remains unacceptably high and has been on the increase for the third year in a row reaching 821 million people. After years of advances in fighting in hunger, we have returned to levels of undernourishment that we witnessed a decade ago. Worse still is that today, multiple forms of malnutrition co-exist and obesity is on the rise worldwide, affecting 13.3 percent of the global adult population. If the trend continues, the number of people who are overweight or obese will surpass the number of undernourished people in the world.
Meanwhile, a staggering amount of food is lost or wasted every year representing one-third of the food we produce, equivalent to 1.3 billion tons of food each year that ultimately does not reach our plates. In developing countries, the situation is aggravated by poor infrastructure and facilities for storage, processing, packaging and marketing. The implication is not only on the availability of food supplies but also on its enormous environmental footprint, generating annually about eight percent of total anthropogenic Green House Gas emissions. These, in turn, will take their own toll on agriculture and our efforts to feed today’s hungry and the additional two billion people we will need to feed by the middle of this century.
The question we need to ask ourselves is how much time is left to get back on track for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals, especially SDG-2 which aims to eradicate hunger and all forms of malnutrition by 2030?
To address these challenges, we need a new way of thinking because the approaches we’ve become accustomed to through the centuries and in recent decades may no longer be as effective to help feed the population of tomorrow.
In search of alternatives, the focus must be on policy making – one that decisively shifts to more inclusive solutions that foster investment in rural areas, which remains central to the global objective of ending hunger by 2030. In doing so, there is scope for creating job opportunities, preserving our landscapes and cultures, limiting ill-prepared migration, fighting climate change and ultimately feeding the world. A rural focus is indeed critical as approximately 80 percent of the extreme poor today are living in these areas – and they are the most food insecure of all. The untapped potential of women in rural areas of many countries – giving them equal access to credit and land for example – would too be a huge help in producing more food with existing human resources.
For far too long, and in general, rural areas have been seen as poverty traps, but they can be dynamic and a source of social innovation. Transforming food systems through rural development strategies and sustainable, climate resilient agriculture practices are central to this process and can unlock their potential. As such, rural towns and secondary cities can play a crucial role in structural and rural transformation by strengthening rural-urban linkages, creating higher demand for goods, services and food, helping to develop territorial markets (short circuits) and inclusive value chain models while generating employment that leads to poverty reduction (the FAO State of Food and Agriculture 2017).
However, policies targeting investment in rural areas alone are not sufficient and must go along with a “whole food system” approach, building on everyone’s participation and better individual choices, including on the way we consume food. We also need more solidarity at local, regional and global levels. In a globalized world, cooperation between countries is indeed becoming increasingly important to deliver international public goods and turning into an SDG mindset. As such, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) launched by China, and its agriculture development component, has the potential to influence the food systems locally, regionally or globally and bring development and market opportunities to remote areas which have largely failed to benefit from the expansion of global trade for the last four decades.
However, to achieve effective rural development and alleviate poverty, BRI infrastructure investments are a “necessary but insufficient” condition. The impact of infrastructure investments on rural poverty and food security will depend on many different factors. Well-designed measures, that benefit both women and men, and complement infrastructure investments, are necessary to ensure that poverty alleviation, food security and pro-poor outcomes can be achieved. Private sector investment in activities such as agricultural production, logistics, storage and processing, are also encouraged and will be key to achieving the above-mentioned goals. To ensure that private agricultural investments benefit local communities and promote rural development, efforts should be made to ensure the investments and business models adopted use an inclusive and sustainable framework. This will benefit both investors and local communities, by applying international standards such as the CFS-Principles for Responsible Investment in Agriculture and Food Systems, the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests in the Context of National Food Security, and the OECD-FAO Guidance on Responsible Agricultural Supply Chains.
If there is no one-size-fits-all solution for solving such a complex global issue, there are reasons for hope and opportunities are emerging to unlock the potential of rural areas to meet the needs of many. Initiatives are flourishing around the world in this area, paving the way for more sustainable and inclusive food systems. From local to global, such initiatives must be connected and scaled up, supported by public policy and stimulated by private investment, if we are to have any chance of achieving the SDGs by 2030. If implemented successfully, such approaches can create the conditions to sustainably feed a growing population and fight poverty at the same time.
Vincent Martin is UNFAO Representative in China and DPR Korea. The author contributed this article to China Watch exclusively. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of China Watch.
All rights reserved. Copying or sharing of any content for other than personal use is prohibited without prior written permission.
