Food Crises

Diana
Dragu

A food crisis occurs when rates of hunger and malnutrition rise sharply at local, national,
or global levels. This definition distinguishes a food crisis from chronic hunger, although
food crises are far more likely among populations already suffering from prolonged
hunger and malnutrition. A food crisis is usually set off by a shock to either supply or
demand for food and often involves a sudden spike in food prices. Timmer, C. (2010)

CAUSES OF FOOD CRISIS

poverty

conflicts
natural disaster

global food prices

disease

complex emergencies

Poverty
The main reason why most people
are unable to feed themselves is not
that food is unavailable but they
cannot afford it.
Poverty also reduces food output.

Natural disasters
The impact of natural disasters such as drought, flooding, hurricanes and
earthquakes can vary according to people's levels of poverty. Droughts tend to hit the
poorest subsistence farmers much harder than large commercial growers, who have
access to better irrigation and more resilient seed types. Climate change is having an
increased impact on food production as droughts and flooding become more frequent
and more severe.

Conflict can drive people from their homes and away from their normal food supply, leave
them unable to afford food or simply stop them planting. Other people may lose their incomes
and therefore be unable to afford food.
War makes delivery of food much more difficult, particularly if aid workers are attacked
and supplies are looted.

Conflicts

Global food prices

Rising global food prices

affect people's ability to buy
enough to feed their families.
Not surprisingly, the hardest hit
are the poorest especially the
urban poor, who can spend as
much as 80 percent of their
income on food.

Disease
The HIV/AIDS pandemic in southern Africa
has contributed to food shortages both through
killing

farmers,

destroying

critical

local

knowledge and pushing families deeper into

poverty thereby often cutting their ability to
grow and produce food.
In 2014 Ebola outbreak in West Africa, also
put pressure on food supplies when people are
afraid to deliver to affected areas, or because of
travel restrictions.

Complex emergencies
In 2010 and 2011, Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia were almost equally affected by poor
rains and crop failure. But in Somalia, the impact of the drought was worsened by the lack
of a functioning government and by a conflict which impeded traditional drought coping
strategies and made it difficult for aid agencies to reach the most vulnerable. A famine was
declared there in 2011, and an estimated 260,000 people died.

Impact
As the rise in the prices of grains accelerated, some countries reacted by banning
or limiting their exports of grain, or importing additional supplies over and above
usual imports.

The impact of the price rises has varied between

countries, depending in part on the sensitivity of local
markets to global price movements and the degree to
which countries are dependent on food imports. Liberia
a country heavily dependent on imported food

has

suffered badly, while in the Central African Republic,

where the economy is based on agriculture and domestic
production meets a greater proportion of food needs,
impacts have been more limited.
In many cases, already vulnerable countries or population groups, such as those affected by conflict or
repeated natural disasters, women-headed households and the urban poor, were expected to be hardest-hit. Most of
the 30 countries and territories identified by the World Food Programme (WFP) as at risk are already of
humanitarian concern, including Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Ethiopia, Haiti,
Kenya, Liberia, Niger, the Palestinian territories, Somalia and Zimbabwe.

Long term perspective

Many studies were done to simulate the impact of increased food
prices, with urban, displaced, pastoralists and smallholder farmers expected
to be worst-affected. Recent field studies have confirmed these assumptions,
and also show that people affected by the prices increases responded by
reducing the quantity and diversity of their diet. They have also seen reduced
expenditure on healthcare, education and other basic goods.
New scientific models show that if we dont change course, in less
than three decades industrial civilization will essentially collapse due to
catastrophic food shortages, triggered by a combination of climate change,
water scarcity, energy crisis, and political instability that are fueled by war.