Relevance: G.S paper II question with answer: 2019
Approach:
The demand of the question is that you should substantiate with examples and data to show how there is growing divergence between the poverty and hunger.
- In the intro, mention the present condition of hunger in India despite on of the best GDP numbers in the world.
- In the 1st part of the main body, you need to explain with examples about how the government’s expenditure of social sector is decreasing and thus leading to poor spending more on non-food essentials like Health, Medicines etc.
- The demand of the question is that you should substantiate with examples and data to show how there is growing divergence between the poverty and hunger.
- In the intro, mention the present condition of hunger in India despite on of the best GDP numbers in the world.
- In the 1st part of the main body, you need to explain with examples about how the government’s expenditure of social sector is decreasing and thus leading to poor spending more on non-food essentials like Health, Medicines etc.
Model Answer
Why India is Unable to Mitigate Hunger When We Are Producing More Food than Ever?
Detailed analysis
Despite the fact that India’s score in the Global Hunger Index has fallen to 31.1 from 38.8 between 2000 and 2018, the issue of hunger is often relegated to the background. India’s rank in the Global Hunger Index has also fallen to 103 (ranked out of 119 countries).
In terms of policy, hunger, as an issue, is not dealt with directly, and with urgency. Instead, it is kept under the larger purview of economic development which expects that wealth will percolate to solve the problem of hunger. This formulation makes a number of incorrect assumptions about the relationship between hunger and other social structures. It is, at best, an indirect method that does nothing to immediately address the alarming issue of hunger that India is facing at present.
In this reading list, we look at the ways in which hunger has been conceptualised and dealt with in India.
Is Poverty the Primary Factor Responsible for Food Insecurity?
India is currently experiencing a “food-budget squeeze” owing to shrinking social expenditure by the government.
This makes the urban and rural poor dependent on private entities for essential services like education and transportation, which are likely to be more expensive. Consequently, the portion of income that can be spent on food also shrinks.
“The findings of study suggest that rather than being a matter of choice, the poor have been increasingly forced to spend more on non-food essential items such as education, healthcare, transportation, fuel and lighting.
The share of monthly expenditure devoted to these items has increased at such a pace that it has absorbed all the increase in real income over the past three decades.
This has led to a “food budget squeeze”, which has meant relatively stagnant real food expenditure over the last two decades. Several factors have led to or compounded the effects of the food budget squeeze.”
Who Suffers the Most Because of Hunger?
It is quite evident now that women are the worst affected by hunger because the patriarchal structures of families in India teach them to go hungry, when food is scarce.
From the case studies of two devastating famines in the 19th century, she found that female life chances are relatively better in South India as compared to North India.
Why Has India’s Rank Deteriorated in the Global Hunger Index?
Between 2008 and 2014, India’s position on the Global Hunger Index seemed to have been improving. Thereafter, India’s position began to deteriorate again.
Given that malnutrition is a multidimensional phenomenon (UNICEF 1994), the revised GHI formula is able to depict a relatively truer state of hunger in countries across the globe.
Inclusion of stunting ensures consideration of rigid cultural factors, while that of wasting represents aspects of diet quality as well. Also, stunting is an indicator of long-term growth failure, and therefore, must be accounted for in any analysis of potential threat a given level of child malnutrition poses for a country.
This is one of the key reasons the sustainable development agenda of the United Nations associate bodies display primary concern towards stunting.”
How Do We Address the Problem of Hunger?
Despite the fact that the rate of global food production has been consistently higher than the rate of population growth, there is a persistent and pervasive crisis when it comes to food security.
Hunger can only be dealt with by, carrying out policies of income redistribution, which respond to objectives of social justice rather than economic efficiency as perceived by neo-liberalism.
A substantial push in public provisioning towards social protection might go a long way in ensuring food security.
In most developing countries one of the biggest issues, with respect to public provisioning towards social protection, to address hunger and food insecurity is organically connected with that of adequate “fiscal” or “expenditure” space. Contrary to the view that countries with low GDP cannot create such a space, we would argue that even at low levels of income it is possible to mobilise adequate resources for the provisioning of social protection.
Neither conceptually nor historically, there is no reason to believe that a country needs to wait to reach relatively high levels of per capita income before it can make adequate progress in this regard, even though, higher income of course helps in doing so.
While it is understood that primary cause of hunger in poverty, there is an increasing trend that shows the expenditure of poor constitutes more than food.
The concept of Multi-Dimensional Poverty shows that lack of education and living standards are as essential as food in understanding poverty.
The reasons for expenditure on non-food expenditure by poor:
- Our failure to provide quality and free public health facilities resulted in poor spending more on private hospitals. Over 70% health expenditure are spent from out of pocket as per a survey report.
- Majority of employment in India is under unorganized sector who are not covered by social security schemes like ESI and EPFO. Meeting unforeseen expenditures thus become a burden for poor.
- Unhealthy practices like using polluting cooking fuels such as chullas make poor women vulnerable to pulmonary diseases.
- Lack of accessibility and quality in government schools also forcing them to choose private options where fee are hefty.
Health and education expenditure, as a percent of overall income makes it highest for the poor.
As Amartya Sen states, government should adopt a capability approach to addressing poverty issue by increasing its spending on health and education. Without which, non- food expenditure is becoming a burden the poor cannot bear.