On Sunday, UN chief Ban-Ki Moon warned that there must be an increase in global food production to stall rapidly increasing food prices. The rise in prices by 40% since mid 2007 has already started to cause conflict and destabilisation in certain parts of the world. Ban also promised to create a task force to address the issue, highlighting the level of the crisis: "We must make no mistake, the problem is big.”
At the beginning of April, the Indian government took the unprecedented step of banning the export of certain rice stocks. Elsewhere in the world, Saudi Arabia has slashed import taxes, the president of the Ivory Coast has cancelled custom duties in a bid to quell violent protests over rising food costs and similar protests left four people dead and at least 20 wounded in Haiti. In March, Josette Sheeran, the head of the UN World Food Programme (WPF), warned that price rises could continue to 2010, as global food reserves stand at their lowest levels in 30 years. Labelling these events as "the new face of hunger", Sheeran put the issue of food security firmly at the top of the world agenda.
Food security was among the subjects highlighted in the World Economic Forum Global Risks 2008 report, which noted that it has changed from a peripheral concern to a global one, and it may become one of the major risks of the modern age.
Rising demand
There is little doubt that food security could impact the world as a whole, not just those nations considered poor. In 2007, the price of many staple foods soared to record levels. According to the World Economic Forum, last year the UK alone saw a 4.7% in the price of food and drink as prices rose at the fastest rate in 14 years. In China, prices have risen by 17.6% overall, an issue which has been made worse by the increased cost of living.
Industry analysts have identified a range of factors behind spiralling food prices, but many suggest that an expanding population is one of the key elements. Despite the UN’s estimation that the global population will swell above nine billion by 2050, inevitably putting a strain on global food reserves, there are other important factors which should not be ignored.
Peter Melchett, policy and campaign director at the Soil Association, which promotes organic food, farming and sustainable forestry, argues that not only has the entire debate around food security been oversimplified, but that “the increase in the demand side of the equation is being focused on too heavily. Demand has been rising steadily for decades and will continue”. He feels that poor harvests and the strain currently being felt in the financial markets, as speculative money is increasingly put into commodities, are having an impact. However, Mr Melchett identifies the increasing use of biotechnology as a factor in global food shortages.
Biofuels
The use of biofuels in agriculture has been championed as one way to alleviate, if not solve, the environmental issues currently facing governments. The US has devoted a substantial amount of space to the manufacture of biofuels - by 2010 they are set to consume 30% of the US corn crop. Meanwhile, the UK Government’s Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation declares that 5% of all car fuel must come from renewable sources by the same year.
But the production of biofuels means placing further strain on already over-subscribed agricultural sources, a concern shared by both the Soil Association’s Peter Melchett and the British Government’s new Chief Scientific Adviser, Professor John Beddington. Mr Melchett says biofuels "are an unacceptable waste of money”, while Professor Beddington summarised the dilemma facing policymakers at a conference in Westminster: “It is very hard to imagine how we can see a world growing enough crops to produce renewable energy and at the same time meet the enormous increase in the demand for food which is quite properly going to happen as we alleviate poverty.”
The World Economic Forum’s Global Risks 2008 also reports that "the growing importance of biofuels has prompted fears that the dynamics of the energy economy will be introduced to global food markets, dramatically increasing price volatility, particularly of staple foods”.
Climate change
Moreover, not all biofuels are in fact environmentally friendly. New research has revealed that more carbon is lost than gained when land is converted for the use of growing biofuel crops. Joe Fargione, the author of the report and a scientist for The Nature Conservancy says “all the biofuels we use now cause habitat destruction, either directly or indirectly. Global agriculture is already producing food for six billion people. Producing food-based biofuel too will require that still more land be converted to agriculture.”
On top of this, changes of global temperature as a result of climate change could result in increased flooding in certain areas and droughts in others. In fact, Dr Richard Washington predicts in the Lloyd’s report 'Rapid climate change': “Long-term drying and near permanent drought conditions could evolve for certain regions.” Needless to say such changes would have an impact on the availability of food supplies, resulting in an even greater demand on further reduced supplies.
The World Bank estimates that 33% of the world’s population faces political unrest as a result of food shortages in the future. In this context, food security is a very real emerging risk that threatens to wreak havoc worldwide. Policymakers must act now.
