The problem of food deficit and poverty

The need of the hour in developing India is to eradicate extreme hunger and poverty. We need a coherent policy framework in achieving that end. In our country more than 65% of the population relies on agriculture as their only source of livelihood and with the sector as such registering below 4pc growth rates, its pretty discursive that this is the section of the population that is in crying need of poverty alleviation measures. The most important measure in reducing poverty would be to alleviate the hunger and food requirements of the BLP (Below the Line of Poverty) category.

The present scenario as outlined below does raise a lot of concern for policy makers all across the globe:

*Rapid urbanisation in the developing world and the resultant impact on food markets
*Deterioration of natural resources all across the globe due to industrial demand
*Ineffective farm produce and lack of superior technology to generate high yielding crops
*Imbalanced subsidy regime in developed world vis a vis developing and under
developed nations (i would avoid calling any underdeveloped nation as a third world country
simply because if they are "poor" today its because of the exploitation by the colonial powers
that were occupying them in the past)
* Threats to global peace and security, political imbalance in various countries which exacerbate
poverty concerns
* Rapid demand for food with rise in population is placing a huge strain on environmental
resources

Food security has become a formidable, perennial challenge for the global economy. Food security is all about producing more than enough quantity of food for every human being and addressing the needs of the undernourished populace of the world. It also needs to make use of well developed information systems today to pinpoint the exact location where there is a supply deficit of food and mobilise rapid transport systems to move food quickly to these areas.

The lesson to date is that no sustainable poverty alleviation program will be successful unless it implants itself with efforst to improve rural livelihoods which would mean boosting their income resources. Economic growth originating in agriculture will have a strong impact on poverty and hunger eradication. Increasing employment and productivity in agriculture will stimulate demand for non agricultural goods and as a corollary, the demand for agro based goods should stem up from the non agro based population. Investment in poverty alleviation and hunger reduction is seen as a welfare measure but however it is this investment which generates superior economic returns going forward.

Technological Access
Improved technology, especially for small-scale farmers, hastenes poverty reduction
through increased crop yields and higher incomes. His access to technology has been hampered by gaps in infrastructure, seed and input markets and very often by his inability to fund these inputs. A great deal needs to be done to alleviate small farmers’ constraints to technology access and profitable use. Technologies that build on and complement local knowledge tend to be particularly effective in meeting the needs of poor farmers in marginal environments. Cheap and effective supply of low cost credit by the banking sector with flexible repayment norms and subsidy support from government agencies are the means to the end in this regard. Vigilance mechanisms should be strengthened by policy makers to ensure that the flow of credit/public investments in this sector finds its way to right end user i.e the poor farmer, through appropriate channels leaving no scope for peculation by middlemen and unscrupulous agents.

Importance of Trade

Trade offers opportunities for the poor and food insecure by acting as a catalyst for
change and by promoting conditions in which the food insecure are able to raise their
incomes and live longer, healthier, and more productive lives.

Opening national agricultural markets to international competition – especially from
subsidized competitors, before basic market institutions and infrastructure are in place
can undermine the agricultural sector with long term negative consequences for poverty
and food security. To minimize the adverse effects and to take better advantage of emerging opportunities, such as those arising from agriculture diversification to bioenergy and other non-food products, governments need to understand better how trade policy fits into the national strategy to promote poverty reduction and food security. Expanding the benefits of trade for the
poor requires a range of other factors, including market infrastructure, institutions and
domestic policy reforms.

Public and Private Investment

Public investment in infrastructure, agricultural research, education and extension is
essential in stimulating private investment in agriculture. But actual public expenditures for agriculture and rural development in the developing world do not reflect the importance of the sector to their national economies and the livelihood of their populations. In fact, government expenditures on agriculture come closest to matching the economic importance of the sector in those countries where hunger is least prevalent.FDI or FII inflows into any country also ignore this vital sector given the cyclical pattern of the industry as well as the longer payback period. Private investment will always follow public expenditure in rural infrastructure and the respective governments have to take the seed intiatives.

Marketing Intiatives:

The expanding urban markets is a major challenge for agriculture and food marketing systems in the years to come. Rapidly rising urban food demand, accompanied by trends towards diet diversification, induces an increasingly commercial orientation of production systems, while inefficiencies in the marketing and transport infrastructure will either provide incentives for the location of production in semi-urban areas or encourage lower cost imports.

Urbanisation increases the scope for economies of scale in food marketing and
distribution, while reductions in transactions costs increase the size of the market for
distributors and retailers. The result is not only an impressive increase in the volume of food
marketing handled by supermarkets, but also substantial organisational and institutional
changes throughout the food marketing chain. Now as a result of the retail revolution, inetermediaries and middlemen have been eliminated as a whole and the farmers have begun benefiting from good realisations for their crops. Improvements in the supply chain effected by these retailers through cold storage mechanisms would enrich the quality and productivity of agri products.

Various governments across the globe must take the required initiatives and retain continuos focus on promoting the agriculture sector and tweaking its growth rates through coherent policy measures with the joint efforts and assistance from international institutions like WHO, UN and financial powerhouses like World bank, ADB and IMF. This can go a long way in preserving the world's ecosystem, its biodiversity and would ultimately promote the twin objectives of poverty alleviation and effective environmental governance.