India ranks 94 among 107 countries in Global Hunger Index; falls in ‘serious’ category

Eastern Mirror Desk
Dimapur, Oct. 17 (EMN): India has ranked 94th among 107 countries in the recently published Global Hunger Index (GHI) 2020.

“India has made considerable progress in tackling hunger and under-nutrition in the past two decades, yet this pace of change has been uneven and many have been left behind,” the report stated.

The GHI is a tool for measuring and tracking hunger at global, regional, and national levels. GHI scores are based on the values of four component indicators: undernourishment (share of the population with insufficient caloric intake), child wasting (share of children under age five who have low weight for their height, reflecting acute under-nutrition), child stunting (share of children under age five who have low height for their age, reflecting chronic under-nutrition), and child mortality (mortality rate of children under age five, partly reflecting the fatal mix of inadequate nutrition and unhealthy environments).

Based on the values of the four indicators, the GHI determines hunger on a 100-point scale where 0 is the best possible score (no hunger) and 100 is the worst. Each country’s GHI score is classified by severity, from low to extremely alarming.

On the GHI severity scale, India was under the “serious” category with a score of 27.2.

Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Chile and China were among the top performing countries with a GHI score of less than five in 2020. Ranked 107, Chad is in the bottom of the list, followed by Timor-Leste, Madagascar, Haiti, and Mozambique.

Among India’s neighbouring countries, Sri Lanka is ranked at 64, Nepal-73, Bangladesh-15, Myanmar-78, and Pakistan-88.

According to the report, 15.2% of the Indian population is undernourished, ‘meaning that they do not receive enough calories per day’.

It further added that 38.7% of children under five are stunted (low height for their age), reflecting chronic under-nutrition; 15.1% of children under five are wasted (low weight for their height), reflecting acute under-nutrition and 4.8% of children die before the age of five.

“India’s agricultural growth rate increased phenomenally in the decades following the green revolution that turned the country from a ‘ship-to-mouth economy’ into a land able to provide food security. However, the revolution has come with several significant limitations. As a result, a more ecologically and socially sustainable ‘evergreen revolution’ is needed,” it stated.

It further stated that priority should be given to agriculture and its central role of providing food security, reducing poverty and generating employment.

“Turning one’s back on agriculture, particularly in a time when the climate is changing considerably, will put the food security of the 1.25 billion people living in India in jeopardy,” it said.