global perspective of hunger and food insecurity

SUSTAINABLE FOOD SECURITY AND POVERTY REDUCTION

THROUGH AGRICULTURAL PROCESSING BY

ENGR. DR. ADESOLA SATIMEHINAg. Head of Department

Dept of Agricultural and Bioresources EngineeringFederal University Oye-Ekiti

GLOBAL PERSPECTIVE OF HUNGER AND FOOD INSECURITY

• The 2007 food price crisis, which was repeated in 2010, led to food riots in many countries across the world such as Greece, India and Mexico etc.

• The crisis was compounded by worldwide financial crisis

1999 – 2007

800 million

1999 – 2007

Over 1 billion50% - Smallholder farmers22% - Rural landless squatters20% - Urban poor8% - Fishermen,

animal herdsmen, forest dwellers

> 44 million more since June 2010

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• Scrimshaw (1986) described hunger as an unnecessary disgrace to our global society having serious political, economic, and social consequences.

• The UN Resources for Speakers on Global Issues, calls it “the greatest scandal of our age”. Hunger is unnecessary because we produce more than enough to feed every single person in the world

CHALLENGES TO WORLD FOOD SECURITY

• Rising food prices• Population growth• Rapid diet changes• Threats to agricultural production• Inefficient production practices and supply chains• Declining investment in food system research. • In addition to causing widespread human suffering, food insecurity contributes to migration to urban areas and across borders, and political and economic instability.

CHALLENGES TO WORLD FOOD SECURITYPopulation growtho As at 7.00 am today 29th January 2013, the world population was estimated at 7,062,714,776 (US Census Bureau).

o Africa alone accounts for > 1 billiono World population to hit 9 billion by 2050o Africa to host 1.9 – 2.2 inhabitants by 2050o By 2050 demand for food in Africa is expected to triple (Thoraya Obeid – ED, UN Population Fund: speaking on the BBC in 2009 )

THE AFRICAN SCENERIO• In 1950, the population ratio for developing countries to developed countries is projected to shift from 2:1.

• By 2050 the ratio is expected to change to 6:1. • As the world population has grown

o The land available per capita in 1950 was 13.5 ha/person

oBy 2050 it is going to shrink to 1.5 ha/person• 4% of GDP is invested into agriculture• <6% of total spending agriculture R&D comes from private companies: many of them on agricultural products for industrial raw materials

Africa’s population figures by sub-region (millions)

Source: UNPF (2009) State of the World Report

Sub-Region Population (millions)

Central Africa 125.7East Africa 318.8North Africa 209.4West Africa 298.6Total 952.5

A cross-section of Africa’s teaming population

HUMAN RIGHTS DIMENSION OF FOOD SECURITY

• Access to food is not a privilege: it a fundamental human right

• Hunger, is a violation of the right of man to food. Hunger and food insecurity, therefore have grave human rights implications

• According to Oliver De Schutter, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, the right to food is a human right recognized under international law which protects the right of all human beings to feed themselves in dignity, either by producing their food or by purchasing it.


• The Economic, Social and Cultural Rights Committee of the United Nations Commission for Human Rights authoritatively stated in its General Comment 12 that “The right to adequate food is realized when every man, woman and child, alone or in community with others, has physical and economic access at all times to adequate food or means for its procurement.”


• The Economic, Social and Cultural Rights Committee of the UN Commission for Human Rights authoritatively stated in its General Comment 12 that “The right to adequate food is realized when every man, woman and child, alone or in community with others, has physical and economic access at all times to adequate food or means for its procurement.”


The right to food is recognized in the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Art. 25) as part of the right to an adequate standard of living, and is enshrined in the 1966 International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (Art. 11).


It is also recognized in specific international instruments such as the Convention on the Rights of the Child (Art. 24(2)(c) and 27(3)), the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (Art. 12(2)), or the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (Art. 25(f) and 28(1)).

WHAT ARE THE CONSEQUENCES OF HUNGER AND FOOD INSECRUTITY

• Hunger reduces the energy people need for an active life.

• Undernourishment caused by hunger makes it hard to study, work or perform other physical activities.

• Undernourishment is particularly harmful for women and children.

• Constant hunger weakens the immune system and makes people more vulnerable to diseases.

• Mothers living with constant hunger often give birth to underweight and weak babies, and face increased risk of death in childbirth.

WHAT ARE THE CONSEQUENCES OF HUNGER AND FOOD INSECRUTITY

Health consequences• Poorer overall health status and compromises the ability to resist illness

• Elevated occurrence of health problems such as stomach aches, headaches, colds, ear infections, and fatigue

• Greater incidence of hospitalizations

ADVERSE CONSEQUENCES OF HUNGER AND FOOD INSECURITY FOR CHILDREN

Psycho-social and Behavioural consequences• Higher levels of aggression, hyperactivity, and anxiety as well as passivity

• Difficulty getting along with other children (and self withdrawal)

• Increased need for mental health services


Learning and Academic consequences• Impaired cognitive functioning and diminished capacity to learn

• Lower test scores and poorer overall performance at school

• Repeating a grade in school• Increased school absenteeism, tardiness, and suspension from school


School Food Programme

WHAT ARE THE CAUSES OF HUNGER IN AFRICA?

• Poverty is the principal cause of hunger in Africa and elsewhere.

• Poverty may be defined as the state of a person not having enough money to meet his/her basic needs including food, clothing, shelter and health benefits.

• Simply put, people who do not have sufficient income to purchase enough food may be considered to be poor.


• Yes, conflict and drought, for example, are certainly important causes of hunger, but the most typical situation is that people just do not have enough income to purchase the food that they need.


• Africa is still faced with mass poverty and remains the poorest continent.

• Sub-Saharan Africa in particular has the majority of its population living in absolute poverty, subsisting on less than US $ 1 a day, and suffering from chronic hunger, malnutrition and pandemic diseases (Nyange et al., 2011).


• 75% of the rural population comprises of peasant farmers who earn a living from small plots of poor soils, in tropical environments that are increasingly prone to drought, floods, bushfires, and hurricanes.


• Crop yields in the rural areas are low and stagnant; and epidemics of pests and diseases often ruin crops.

• Livestock suffers from endemic diseases, some of which are zoonotic.

• In all these causes of hunger enumerated, poverty is at the root of them all.

WHY IS THERE SO MUCH POVERTY IN AFRICA?

• Despite all the wealthy resources in its possession, Africa is the world's poorest continent.

• Today, over 300 million African people (i.e. about 30% of the people) live on less than $1 US per day. The incidence of extreme poverty never seems to abate


• What causes this entrenched poverty, on a continent rich with natural resources?

• The question of what causes poverty in Africa is the subject of intense academic debate. Unfortunately, poverty in Africa doesn't result from just one or two causes. There are a number of different intricately interwoven factors, all interacting with one another, that make the problem of entrenched poverty extremely complex and difficult to solve.


• Some of the major causes of poverty in Africa are:

• harmful economic systems, • Wars and armed conflicts, • poor farm policy,• lack of access to credit, • rampant unemployment, • lack of access to education,• Pandemic of disease


• Lack of infrastructure– Lack of access to clean water is worst in Cairo, Lagos and Kinshasa

• corrupt government, • poor leadership• high crime rate.

CURRENT EFFORTS AT MITIGATING FOOD INSECURITY AND POVERTY?

• In their efforts at addressing the problem of hunger and food insecurity most national governments in Africa tend to act along the line of enhancing crop and land productivity, through the use of improved seeds, application of chemical fertilizers, provision of irrigation water and review of land ownership policies.

• As a result of the interventions at boosting agricultural production, we find that year in year out, farmers, especially in Nigeria, produce a wide range agricultural products but a substantial proportion of what is grown is lost at the post-harvest stage.


• It is estimated that as much as 25% of fruits, 40% vegetables and 15-20% grains are wasted after harvest. These losses are of grave economic consequences as they represent wastage in the farmers’ effort, farm inputs and investments. More so, those crops that are lost are no longer available to man. It is crucially important, therefore, that post-harvest losses must be eliminated in order to enhance food security.


Olayemi et al.(2012) carried out an assessment of postharvest losses of some crops in eight local government areas of Rivers State. They found out that all the 450 farmers studied in the three zones used traditional methods of storage for their produce and experienced heavy postharvest losses. According to the researchers, the mean postharvest losses were 35% for fish, 37.33% for yam, 27.67% for cassava, 20.33% for maize, 27% for plantain and 33% for vegetable.


These levels of postharvest losses are unacceptable.

High postharvest losses are clearly a disincentive to farmers as they do not obtain rewards that are commensurate with their labour.

WHAT IS THE ROLE OF AGRICULTURAL PROCESSING IN MITIGATING FOOD

INSECURITY AND POVERTY?• It can be seen, therefore, that improving crop productivity is generally not enough to lift smallholder farmers out of poverty. Farmers must also add value to their primary production and diversify their range of income-earning activities, both on and off the farm. Surpluses must therefore be stored temporarily, but processed into more stable products


INSECURITY AND POVERTY?• Processing of agricultural produce has tremendous benefits. It helps to improve postharvest handling. reduce postharvest losses, increase income and improve the livelihoods of smallholder farmers as well as those of the agro-processors. Agricultural processing also helps to prevent products’ spoilage and improve its shelf life. It helps to retain nutritive value of products and ensure availability of products all the year round.


INSECURITY AND POVERTY?

• Processing helps to transform an agricultural commodity into a more palatable form and improve the flavour of edible products. Agro-processing helps to preserve products’ integrity so as to ensure their availability even at distant and remote places.



• Agricultural processing refers to the series of operations performed on a commodity (be it from agriculture, forestry or fisheries) so as to transform it from its raw state into food and non-food consumer products.


INSECURITY AND POVERTY?• Agricultural processing therefore include primary processing operations such as seed and grain cleaning, sorting, grading and separation, threshing and shelling.


INSECURITY AND POVERTY?• All of these primary processes are geared toward preparing the

produce for secondary processing such as chipping, dicing, dehydration, deep frying, size reduction by milling, and for tertiary processing such as in extrusion, pasteurisation and canning.


INSECURITY AND POVERTY?• Agricultural processing therefore include primary processing

operations such as seed and grain cleaning, sorting, grading and separation, threshing and shelling. All of these primary processes are geared toward preparing the produce for secondary processing such as chipping, dicing, dehydration, deep frying, size reduction by milling, and for tertiary processing such as in extrusion, pasteurisation and canning.



• In all of these agricultural processing operations, people are required for the design of the processing techniques, and fabrication of machines for the operations.


INSECURITY AND POVERTY?• People are also required for the design and construction of diverse crop storage structures including silos, bunkers, cold storage facilities and for environmental control in storage.



• The processed food must be appropriately packaged and properly stored so as to enhance its effective distribution over time and space. Every one of these processing operations is an avenue for job creation, income generation, poverty reduction and enhance food security.

Examples of value-addition achievable through agro-processing

• Threshing• Drying• Rice milling• Quality control and Inspection of grain• Grain storage• By-product utilization• Rice processing

Examples of value-addition achievable through agro-processing

• Soybean and cowpea flour production• Fruit processing including fruit juice extraction, vegetable oil extraction, seeds decortications

• Cassava processing to produce: chip, gari, cassava flour, cassava starch

• Yam flour and yam starch production • Rice and Maize can be dry-milled into flour• Oil seeds can be fermented• Plantain chips and flour

• Plantain processing has the capacity to create 150,000 jobs in two years. Matured plantain can be processed into many products such as chips and flour.

• Unripe plantain is spiced and deep-fried to produce crispy chips which can be packaged and sold as snacks at schools and to travelers. (The Nation Newspaper: Monday January 21, 2013).

Plantain processing for wealth creation

• The unit operations in plantain processing include peeling, chipping drying, milling and packaging. People are required in these areas as drivers, marketers and machine operators in processing factories

Case Study of Small-scale agricultural processing in parts of Africa

Agroprocessing women group in Ethiopia

Farmers in Kaduna State practice making yam flour Source: Winrock International, 2011, www.winrock.org

http://www.winrock.org/

CONCLUSION• A significant amount of the food produced in African countries is lost after harvest thereby aggravating hunger. Most food crops of Africa such as cassava, banana and sweet potatoes are perishable crops with a lot of storage and post-harvest problems. Productivity is limited by their rapid rate of deterioration soon after harvesting, if processing into more shelf-stable products is delayed.

CONCLUSION• Estimates of post-harvest losses in Africa are hard to determine, but some authorities put losses to as high as 50 percent of what is produced. It is therefore, important to develop and deploy crop varieties with improved shelf life.

• All of this can be arrested if surpluses are converted into more shelf-stable products.

• This enhances food security. Processing activities create employment, wealth and reduces poverty

CONCLUSION

• Agro-processing techniques can also be used to convert agricultural waste into useful products such as industrial fibres, bio-ethanol, animal feeds, fertilizers, cosmetics and pharmaceuticals. African countries should use agro-processing technology to bring about value addition, thereby reducing and/or eliminating post-harvest losses.

CONCLUSION• Technologies for processing and/or value addition are available in many parts of Nigeria: all of which are capable of wealth creation and, thus, poverty reduction.

• Many small and medium scale processing machines are locally manufactured in Lagos, Ibadan, Kaduna, Ilorin and many other cities across the country.

SOME PROCESSING EQUIPMENT MANUFACTURED IN NIGERIA

Cassava flash dryerHammer millCassava grater

Locally manufactured cassava flash dryerSource: Engr (Dr) B.A. Adelekan and Engr V.O. Olomo

Rotary garri fryerSource: Engr (Dr) B.A. Adelekan and Engr V.O.

Olomo

Locally manufactured cassava chipping machinesSource: Engr (Dr) B.A. Adelekan and Engr V.O. Olomo

A 3-tonne rotary paddy rice dryerFabricated in NCRI Pateggi

Paddy rice parboiling vessels equipped with steam boilers

Fabricated in NCRI Pateggi

Medium scale complete rice processing plants

• The multiplier effects of agricultural processing are unquantifiable. A vibrant, competitive agro-processing sector has the capacity to increase production and sales of agricultural products. This in turn will lead to greater demand for agricultural inputs, create more diversified and stable markets, and improve income opportunities for farmers.

CONCLUSION

• Need for strategies to improve food security in Africa

• To attain improved nutritional well-being and sustainable food security in Africa, emphasis should be put on strategies that will reduce the problems of poverty and underdevelopment because these are the underlying impediments to adequate access to food by all individuals.

RECOMMENDATIONS

• Since agriculture is the mainstay of the economies in many African countries, emphasis should therefore be put in developing strategies that will improve agricultural and farming systems, reduce post harvest food losses, improve food processing and marketing systems.

RECOMMENDATIONS

• The private sector should play increased roles agriculture research and efforts.

RECOMMENDATIONS

• More public enlightenment is required to help the general public and especially the farming population to know the enormous but untapped benefits that abound in adding values to their harvest.

RECOMMENDATIONS

• The Department of Agricultural and Bioresources Engineering of FUOYE plans to lead in this enlightenment campaign by organising a National Training Course on Post-harvest Technology and Processing of Agricultural Crops in conjunction with Department of Food Science and Tech, and FIIRO. The training programme is being planned to hold here and hosted by the management of FUOYE. Sponsorship to be sought from SMEDAN, RMRDC, Food Reserve Agency.

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