The number of hungry people in the world dropped to 795 million from 1 billionin 1990-92, to the latestState of Food Insecurity in the World2015 (SOFI).
Released in Rome on May 27, SOFI 2015 reported that inthe developing regions, prevalence of undernourishment declined to 12.9% of the population, down from 23.3% a quarter century ago.
The report published by the UN’sFood and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) and the World Food Programme (WFP) praised the efforts of Africa, in particular western Africa, in achieving theirmillennium developmentgoals (MDG) hunger target.
However, despite the progress, sub-Saharan Africa is the region with the highest prevalence of undernourishment in the world, at 23.2%.
Situation could get better – or worse – depending on how the continent’s and the world’s love affairs with some of its increasingly popular foods plays out.
Early this month, the Ethiopian governmentannounced plansto allow the partial lifting of a ban on exports of teff grain,touted as the newest “superfood” in the healthfood circuits particularly in the Europe and North America.
But the challenge willbe how to get highprices internationally while keeping prices lowlocally, to avoid the fate that befell other “super foods” like quinoa and spelt that became too expensive for ordinary farmers in the end.
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