Growing numbers of people in Asia lack enough to eat as food insecurity rises with higher prices: Food and Agricultural Organization’s report

“Nearly a half-billion people, more than eight in 10 of them in South Asia, were undernourished in 2021 and more than one billion faced moderate to severe food insecurity,” the FAO report said.

Growing numbers of people in Asia lack enough to eat as food insecurity rises with higher prices and worsening poverty, according to a report released on January 24 by the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) and other United Nations agencies.

Nearly a half-billion people, more than eight in 10 of them in South Asia, were undernourished in 2021 and more than one billion faced moderate to severe food insecurity, the report said. For the world, the prevalence of food insecurity rose to more than 29% in 2021 from 21% in 2014.

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“The COVID-19 pandemic was a huge setback, causing mass job losses and disruptions, and the war in Ukraine has pushed up prices for food, energy and fertilizer, putting an adequate diet out of the reach of many millions,” it said.

The report is the fifth annual stocktaking on food insecurity and hunger by U.N. agencies including the FAO, UNICEF, World Health Organization and World Food Program.

Over those years, progress toward alleviating hunger and malnutrition has stalled and then backslid as growing numbers of people lost the wherewithal to get enough to eat. The prevalence of undernourishment as measured by the U.N. agencies was 9.1% in 2021, better than the 14.3% in 2000 but up slightly from 2020.

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