24 Nov 2022 Global Hunger Index
Significance for Prelims: Global Hunger Index 2022
Significance for Mains: Global Hunger Index and associated issues and how to improve the index.
News: India’s ranking in the recently released Global Hunger Index 2022 was 107 out of 121 countries.
About Global Hunger Index(GHI):
- GHI report is jointly published by Concern Worldwide and Welt Hunger Hilfe.
- Since 2000, the Global Hunger Index or GHI, has been released almost every year.
- It measures and tracks hunger at global, regional, and national levels. Global Hunger Index compares hunger levels between countries and regions.
- Intention of GHI: Increase awareness and understanding of the struggle against hunger.
- Reason for mapping hunger: So, that world achieves the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal of “Zero Hunger by 2030”.
- Global Hunger Index 2022 drew attention towards those areas of the world where hunger levels are highest and where additional efforts are required to eliminate hunger.
Calculation of Global Hunger Index(GHI): GHI score is based on four indicators.
- Undernourishment: It is estimated by the share of the population with insufficient caloric intake.
- Child stunting reflecting chronic undernutrition: Its calculation is done by the share of children under age five who have low height for their age.
- Child mortality: It is calculated by the share of children who die before the age of five, partly due to inadequate nutrition and unhealthy environments.
- Child wasting reflecting acute undernutrition: Calculated by the share of children under age five who have low weight for their height.
- Scale of GHI score: It is based on a 100-point scale (a) zero is the best score (no hunger) (b) 100 is the worst.
Index about India: GHI ranking of India has consistently worsened in the last 10 years.
- India is in the ‘serious’ category with a GHI score of 29.1.
- GHI rankings of neighbouring Countries: GHI rankings of Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bangladesh and Pakistan are 64, 81, 84 and 99 respectively.
- Only Country in South Asia that performs worse than India on the index is Afghanistan (109).
Issues associated with Global Hunger Indices:
- Index treated hunger, food security, nutrition and sustainable agriculture as synonymous: Since the UN’s Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 2 has clubbed these terms together. Hence, it is futile to measure the sustainability of agriculture through nutrition data.
- Data did not appreciate the obvious gain made by India: Hunger is not an Indian problem due to subsidised food security schemes. National Sample Survey’s consumption surveys reported that almost every household, rural and urban, are getting two square meals a day.
- Fault in methodology: GHI (Global Hunger Index) is a self-proclaimed peer-reviewed methodology.
- Global Hunger Index is for the entire population but what’s true of children, or women need not be true of the general population.
- Misnomers in terminology: Since in GHI, One-sixth of the weightage is attached to child stunting, 1/6th to child wasting, 1/3rd to child mortality and 1/3rd to under-nourishment so it is not appropriate to call it a hunger index.
- Small Size of the survey: FAO conducted its own Food Insecurity Experience Scale Survey Module to get data on undernourishment or hunger. This poll was administered to a sample size of 3,000, but for a country like India, this sample size was insufficient.
- Serious error in translation of the questionnaires: Answering Hindi questions are not the same as answering English question. For Example The Hindi translation of one Question “Your household ran out of food because of a lack of money or other resources?” is “apke ghar mein bhojana ki kami ho gayi kyonki ghar mei paise ya anya samashadano ki kami thi”. Here “Running out” means there is no food while “Kami” means less food.
- Index does not make a proper distinction between under-nourishment and malnutrition. But, Food and Agriculture Organization( FAO ) equates food insecurity with malnutrition and with hunger.
Way forward:
- Global discourse on food security should shift from hunger to malnutrition.
- Distinct policy for different segments: Global Hunger Index should separate indicators for the general population from those for children.
- Any global indicators connected with children, should take numbers from NFHS-5 (National Family Health Survey). For Example, a Multi-dimensional poverty report by UNDP has used NFHS-5 data to document declines in poverty.
- Inter-generational nature of malnutrition can be tackled by designing comprehensive programmes for adolescent girls.
- Greater involvement of local government and community groups in the design and delivery of tailored nutrition interventions and implementation of public programmes like Integrated Child Development Services( ICDS) and Midday Meal Scheme (MDM) schemes.
- Incentivising behavioural change through cash transfers(JAM trinity i.e. Jan Dhan bank accounts, Aadhaar, Mobile): Cash transfers can encourage people living in acute distress regions with very depressed household purchasing power to seek greater institutional support.
Key facts about India’s national indicator framework for SDGs:
National Family Health Survey (NFHS-5) Report about children below the age of five years: 35.5% were stunted, 19.3% showed wasting, and 32.1% were underweight. Government Initiatives for Holistic Nutrition:
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Further readings:
- Sustainable Development Goals reports
Source: The Hindu; The Indian Express
Article: Trivalising Hunger(Bibek Debroy); What is the Global Hunger Index and how is it calculated?
Article Link:
https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/global-hunger-index-a-survey-that-trivialised-hunger-8259530/
https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/watch-what-is-the-global-hunger-index-and-how-is-it-calculated/article66044536.ece
https://www.thehindu.com/opinion/lead/fixing-indias-malnutrition-problem/article66175213.ece
Yojna IAS Daily current affairs eng med 24th November
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