ISLAMABAD – The danger of food security could be a major concern in the future if the government fails to reform economy to reduce the widening gap between the cost of food and the purchasing power of the people, experts told Pakistan Today.
World Food Programme (WFP) Country Director Wolfgang Herbinger had also showed concern in Geneva a few days ago over high food prices in Pakistan. “The crop outlook is not bad but the food security situation remains difficult because prices remain so high,” Herbinger had stated. The WFP has defined food security as, “Food security exists when all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient, safe, and nutritious food, and to meet their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life.”
As per the definition, the people of the area where food remains unavailable as stated above would be insecure in terms of food and there is a growing fear that this may happen to Pakistan if certain economic steps are not taken by Pakistan on immediate basis to save the country from grave consequences. According to the experts, fear of food insecurity in Pakistan has roots in price-hike, instead of scarcity, which could disrupt food supply and render it unaffordable for most of the people.
“The issue is not that Pakistan is going to have food shortage, as production will be sufficient but the real danger is affordability as recent price-hike is feared to make food inaccessible to most of the people,” said Dr Iqbal Ahmed, a food security expert with Oxfam Pakistan. According to Dr Ahmed, the cost of energy, fertilizers and pesticides have increased manifold over the years.
“When food becomes unaffordable for people, they switch over to cheaper or innutritious food items and this is what we are likely to confront. For making food affordable in Pakistan, the government has to reform economy and remove factors behind the food price-hike and increase income of the people,” Dr Ahmed said warning that if economy was not reformed, crisis in the country might be horrendous in future.
When asked how the economy could be reformed, Dr Ahmed said that the non-developmental expenses of the state were extremely high and that could be reduced to 30 percent to invest the remaining 70 percent on the people. When Amjad Jamal, the WFP spokesman, was contacted in this regard, he said that the WFP operation 2011-12 in Pakistan is the largest in terms of funding and food recipient.
“The WFP operation 2011-12 for Pakistan will cost $620 million and will have 12 million beneficiaries,” Jamal said adding that the size of the project transpired the volume of the crisis too. He also added that Pakistan was likely to face serious distribution issues as gap between the incomes of the people and food prices in the country had reached an alarming level.
