Food Security

According to the World Food Summit organised in Rome in 1996, food security exists when all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and nuritious food to meet their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life (FAO 2001 : 4). Tracking trends in food security requires two interrelated variables (FAO 1996a, Vol 1, Ch2 :3). The first is the per caput availability of food for direct human consumption (also called per caput food supplies). The second variable concerns the distribution of the food supplies within each country. One such relevant level for food security analysis is that of per caput food supplies (Calories/day) equal to 1.55 times the basal metabolic rate (BMR). If a person’s access to food is below this level, he may be classified as chronically undernourished.
FOOD PRODUCTION DOES NOT EQUAL FOOD SECURITY?
 According to FAO report in 2009; 1.02 billion people are undernourished worldwide (FAO 2009). It means that one sixth of world’s population still suffer from hunger and the fear of starvation and they go to bed without having adequate food. This is because the food production is not sufficient. In many developing countries, per caput food supplies may remain stubbornly inadequate to allow for significant nutritional progress (FAO 1996a : ix)
It is important to emphasis that food production is not the same as food availability, and that aggregate availability and ability to acquire food are very different things. As in Pakistan where surplus wheat is produced in the country but still facing food insecurity issues because of smuggling to neighbor countries. As the harvest season nears its completion, wheat smuggling into Afghanistan has reared its ugly head through the mutual connivance of the middleman and unscrupulous officials (The Nation,11/08/10). The middlemen are picking up the crop from farmers at a lower price than the official price and then smuggling it across the border to get a high price. It is just an endless loop that would not just snatch the bread out of the farmer’s mouth, but would have serious impacts for the country’s food security.
In my view more food production does not necessarily mean more food for those who need it. Food production undoubtedly influences food entitlements, the connections are complex and other matters are also being involved, because people’s access to food both depend on purchasing power and on their non-market entitlements, such as right to land for farming and foraging purposes. The peoples in rural areas of Pakistan have a very low purchasing power although food is available and this also accounts towards food insecurity.
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