RISK OF A DISASTER OF HUNGER

Allah Nawaz Samo

When size, duration, severity and intensity of a calamity exceed beyond the resilience
capacity of affected population along with failure of coping mechanisms, a situation like
disaster starts to develop. There are strong indications that it would be beyond the
capacity of over 40 percent of the total households in our country to meet minimum level
of subsistence in the case if current prices of food remain unstable or tend to rise during
the next two months.

This nearly half of the population which is already experiencing substantial food deficits
is at the serious risk of falling into state of absolute hunger. Ironically, all this is
happening not in the backdrop of any natural calamity, drought or civil war. It follows a
tenure in which policy makers always felt pleasure to claim unprecedented economic
growth. The policies designed to achieve and sustain this growth however, left the poor
with very limited choices for securing subsistence level of livelihood. What was attained
in the name of high growth rate was simply an arrangement of ‘capital-augmenting and
labour displacing’, something indicative of ‘growth without development.

The majority of the poor affected by such policy maneuverings belongs to stratum of
landless crop sharers and daily wage labourers who support large families at low average
per capita income levels. Most of these people live in the areas not well serviced by
physical infrastructure and therefore their capability to take advantage of market
opportunities is severely curtailed. Households belonging to this lowest income quartile
spend as much as 91 per cent of their consumption budget on food. The current surge in
prices poses real risk of starvation to this group. Referring to their extreme vulnerability
around the world, IMF Director, Domimique Strauss Kahn issued a warning in recent
world bank spring meeting, of ‘terrible impact’ and ‘dire consequences’ as ‘ hundreds of
thousands of (such) people will be starving’. The situation in 36 countries including
Pakistan may lead to riots.

It seems strange that warning of starvation in new millennium underlines the same reason
which was cited by a British economist Arnold to explain the food crisis that surfaced in
southern India in September 1918. In his report on ‘grain riots’ Arnold wrote, ‘looting
and rioting were expression of the panic and anger felt by the poor classes when faced
with abrupt price rises or sudden disappearance of food grain from bazaars while large
quantities of grain were known to be stacked in warehouses or barges and in railway
yards ready for export elsewhere.’

The same ignominious practice was allowed to take place in Bengal Famine of 1942-43.
Those with command over available food stock made grain a profiting commodity
rendering about 3 million poor masses to starve and eventually die. The government
policies espoused to the export of grain and thereby averted the risk of hunger in Britain
along with extending benefit to affluent traders on the cost of poor Indians. History
records Bengal Famine of 1943 as ‘boom famine’ due to these particular features of
moral degradation and ethical bankruptcy.

In the subsequent years, colonial powers came under severe criticism from press and
intelligentsia for their callousness and criminal apathy. It was realized across every
segment of the society that states had failed miserably in protecting citizen’s basic right
of food for survival. The wide spread public anger compelled world powers to opt for a
collective strategy to prevent absolute hunger and starvation. Agriculture was
incorporated as one of the key sectors in global development agenda. A big portion of
international aid was diverted to newly independent and developing countries to ensure
food security. As a result, most of these countries provided subsidies to growers, built
basic infrastructure and introduced new affordable technologies to improve quality and
quantity of production. The green revolution of sixties further reinforced these efforts
through mechanization, electrification and extension of canals to far-flung rural areas.

The effects of such policy measures can be gauged by the fact that agriculture sector was
contributing 60 percent to GDP of Pakistan in 1951, which declined to 21 percent in
2007. Not only that, prices of cereals and other food, in real terms, had been in decline,
both in the shops of local market and on world markets from 60s to 80s. With the onset of
new millennium, world food market witnessed two radical changes; shift in grain
consumption pattern and conversion of cereals into Ethanol- a form of bio-fuel.

In 2000 around 15 million tones of maize crop in America was turned into ethanol; this
year the quantity is likely to be 85 million tones. This demand of America’s ethanol
programme alone account for over half the world’s unmet need for cereals. Besides, in
most of the developing countries including Pakistan, demand for meat has doubled as
compared to that of in 80s, leading to sharp rise in consumption of grain as animal feed.
Both of these changes, give rise record price hike at a time not of scarcity but of
abundance of food.

The policy makers in Pakistan, during last five years, either ignored or conveniently
overlooked to all these happenings. In February, 2007, the price of maize attained its all
time peak, when exceeded $175 a tonne in world market. In September, 2007, the world
price of wheat rose to over $ 400 a tonne, the highest ever recorded. By mid of 2007, the
world food prices jumped by 75 percent and food-price index touched its unprecedented
highest level. Responding to the gravity of situation, Russia and Venezuela imposed
controls on food prices. China and Brazil invoked their contingency plans. However,
authorities in our country did not bother to take any preparedness measure to tackle the
situation even on this eleventh hour.

Now when, we are included in 36 countries facing the risk of ‘food riots’, the call from
world experts is, ‘to address this (crisis) not just as an immediate emergency but also in
the medium term for development.’ The World Bank, in a report circulated in its recent
spring meeting, clearly points out ‘Pakistan did not have a wide spread social assistance
programme targeting the poorest of poor.’ The policy objective in current scenario,
therefore, need to include a short term relief and recovery package for poor masses in
order to avert the risk of disaster of hunger. At the same time, it also needs to have
medium to long term strategies and safety nets to prevent recurrences of food crisis in
coming years.

The conditional cash transfers through strategies like cash-for-food and food-for-work
have provided immediate relief and recovery to many poor in developing countries. The
rate of success, however, depends on efficiency, transparency and capacity of available
institutional setup. Further more, identifying right people who deserve aid and then
getting access to them overcoming all social biases and political preferences tends to be
major challenges. Notwithstanding all the obstacles, the approach has proved its value
and worth in averting some of the worst hunger disasters in Africa and South Asia.

For long term, we need to transform the poor and vulnerable class to a cadre of small
growers with their own piece of land. This would reduce poverty, create employment, and
increase productivity. America and Europe have achieved current levels of food security
by making this possible in late sixties. It is high time for us to embark on such a noble
mission. The first step towards this mission requires land reforms-something we aspired
for since seventies but not achieved yet.

The writer is a development professional and can be reached at nsamoo@gmail.com.