Ethiopians manage hunger better than us

Rajesh Sinha
DNA, 15 October

In South Asia, only Bangladesh is below India’s 94th position in the Global Hunger Index

NEW DELHI: The second fastest growing economy in the world with an 8% plus growth rate lags behind its south Asian neighbours, except for Bangladesh in the Global Hunger Index.

Ranked 94th among 118 countries in the latest Global Hunger Index (GHI) 2007 from International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), India’s score on the index is 25.03, a negligible improvement from 25.73 in 2003 was 25.73.

Even Ethiopia managed to reduce the index by 12.3, compared with the targeted 24.7, and is placed just ahead of India.

The index, comprising three indices — child malnutrition, child mortality and estimates of the proportion of people who are calorie deficient — ranks countries on a 100 point scale, with 0 being the best (no hunger) and 100 being the worst.

The index is mainly based on proportion of undernourished in the population, prevalence of underweight in children under five years and those under-five mortality rate.

Within South Asia, only Bangladesh does worse than India, with an index value of 28.40. Pakistan is ahead of India at 88th position with GHI of 22.70.

The whole of South Asia is ranked as a hunger hotspot, with hunger levels similar to sub Saharan Africa. The report says although the two regions have virtually identical GHI scores, their determining factors vary: in South Asia women have a lower nutritional status and more often give birth to babies with low birth weight.

In addition, young children are not fed properly for their age and are therefore often underweight. This is the result of the insufficient education of many South Asian women and their low status in society.

In India, where the large majority of South Asia’s population lives, economic growth in the agricultural sector has lagged considerably behind growth in other sectors over recent years.

This has had a negative effect on progress in alleviating poverty and hunger in rural areas. Furthermore, members of the lower castes and certain ethnic minorities continue to be discriminated against in society and are, therefore, disadvantaged with regard to educational opportunities and the labour market, the report says.

The worst country is Burundi with a GHI of 42.37 and the best is Libya with GHI of 0.87.

India is nowhere near the countries it loves to compare itself with. The other countries of the celebrated BRIC quartet are way ahead. Their index values are less than 10: Brazil 4.60, Russia 2.33 and China 8.37. South Africa has an index value of 5.25.

The index covers does not cover highly industrialised countries and some developing countries for which no data was available.