S
ince 2005, prices for rice, wheat, corn, and other food
grains have soared by 83 percent. Many factors are responsible for rising food prices. Higher incomes in China
and India, as well as in other developing countries, have led to
more diversified diets, including greater consumption of meat
and dairy products, contributing to greater demand for feed
grains. Meanwhile, the diversion of crops and agricultural land
for the production of biofuels, particularly corn-based ethanol,
has meant decreasing supplies for human and livestock consumption. When extended drought in key producer countries
is added to the equation, the result is a major jump in prices as
demand begins to outstrip supply. Finally, sky-high oil prices
are contributing to what World Food Program’s Executive Director Josette Sheeran has called “a perfect storm hitting the
world’s hungry.”1
Higher food prices may be good news for some farmers,
but they add a crushing load to the most vulnerable and
poorly nourished people, including young children and
nursing mothers in developing countries. Poor people typically
spend up to 80 percent of their disposable income on food.
Food riots in countries as far-flung as Haiti, the Philippines,
Indonesia, Ethiopia, Burkina Faso, Egypt, and Cameroon
suggest troubling times ahead as fears of hunger take root.2 The
international community must take measures to provide food
and cash assistance to meet immediate needs and to improve
agricultural policies. Increasing demand for staples has not
been matched by investments in agricultural productivity,
especially in developing countries where rising food prices are
felt most acutely. The longer-term impact of this global hunger
crisis could stall or reverse decades of progress against hunger
and extreme poverty and prevent the world from reaching the
Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015.
Bolstering the agricultural sector in poor countries is a smart
investment that will yield substantial dividends, especially when
it comes to hunger. Of the 862 million people worldwide who
are chronically hungry, 75 percent live in rural areas and depend
on agriculture for their earnings, either directly, as farmers or
hired workers, or indirectly in sectors that derive from farming.3 Realizing agriculture’s potential and creating economic
opportunities in rural communities is imperative to achieving
MDG #1, cutting hunger and poverty in half by 2015.
Margaret W. Nea
Agriculture, Hunger, and Poverty
Other Briefing Papers
by Bread for the World Institute
Available at www.bread.org
2 Briefing Paper, June 2008
“No country has been able to achieve a rapid transition out of
poverty without raising productivity in its agricultural sector,”
explains Peter Timmer of the Center for Global Development,
and one might say the same of achieving sustainable reductions
in hunger.4 Decreasing poverty in rural areas has been the main
cause of the decline in extreme poverty (the proportion of people
who live on less than $1 a day) in developing countries—from 28
percent in 1993 to 22 percent in 2002.5 The poorest countries
have largely rural economies: agriculture accounts for roughly