There's a famous saying that goes along the lines of, "If you have food in your fridge, clothes on your back, a roof over your head and a place to sleep, you are richer than 75% of the world." This is especially true for a country like India, going by the latest UN hunger scale report.
As per the report, out of the 1.4 billion people in India, over a billion could not afford a healthy diet in 2021 which raises the question as to why only 813 million are covered by food assistance programs in India.
The 2023 report on food security and nutrition released by five UN agencies earlier this week said 74.1% of Indians, or 1.043 billion people, were unable to afford a healthy diet in 2021. Afghanistan, Haiti and 12 sub-Saharan countries performed worse than India on the GHI. The report also estimated India’s proportion of undernourished population at 16.6 per cent during 2020-2022.
The other countries ranking lower than India include Mozambique, Afghanistan, Haiti, Liberia, Chad, Niger, Lesotho, Yemen, Madagascar, and Somalia. Every other assessed country, besides these nations, had better outcomes than India.
This is despite the fact that the Indian government has programs like Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana (PMGKAY) among its food aid schemes. This scheme provides 5kg free food grain — rice or wheat — per family per month, covering 813 million people. Last month, the Union cabinet approved the scheme for five more years.
Nevertheless, the GHI came out with a study based on four factors to understand the issue at hand. Based on the report, the four aspects were as follows:
1. Undernourishment (refers to the entire population – both children and adults)
2. Child stunting (share of children who have low height for their age)
3. Child under-5 mortality and
4. Child wasting (children who have low weight for their height).
Some of the findings were shocking.
For example, India has the highest child ‘wasting’ (low weight for height) rate across the world, at 18.7%, reflecting acute undernutrition. In fact, ‘wasting’ is considered as the worst form and indicator of children's under-nutrition.
If a country has more than 15% of the children ‘wasted’, it has been marked as ‘very high’ level of concern in the report. India is the only country, thus, where the wasting has been put in the category of ‘very high’.
As far as childhood stunting (low height for age) goes, India, again, comes in the category of ‘very high’ risk countries. More than 35% of kids have been marked stunted in the country, although several other African countries and some East-Asian countries perform worse than India on this parameter.
With about 16.6% of the overall population undernourished, India’s levels of undernourishment have been marked as of ‘medium’ risk. And, in under-5 mortality, India has been categorised as a country with ‘low risk’, with about 3.1% of children dying before the age of five.
The report also looks at the nutrition angle for birth givers. The prevalence of anemia among women aged 15-24 has been reported as a major problem for the country. More than 50% of women and adolescents are anemic in India – one of the highest across the world.
S.V. Subramanian, professor of population health and geography at Harvard University, who is among experts who have studied food deprivation in India, told The Telegraph newspaper from India: “In the light of the Centre’s valid concerns about estimates of hunger and food deprivation in India, the estimate that 813 million people need food aid is surprisingly high and needs further explanation.”