How climate change is exacerbating food insecurity, with dangerous consequences for import-reliant Middle East

RIYADH: Global food insecurity is much worse than previously thought. That's the conclusion of the State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2024 report, published this week by a coalition of UN entities, which found that efforts to combat undernutrition have suffered serious setbacks.

As countries around the world fall short of the UN's second Sustainable Development Goal of “zero hunger” by 2030, the report notes that climate change is increasingly recognized as a key factor exacerbating hunger and insecurity grocery shop.

As a major food importer, the MENA region is considered particularly vulnerable to climate-induced crop failures in source countries and the resulting imposition of protectionist tariffs and commodity price fluctuations.

“Climate change is a driver of food insecurity for the Middle East, where both global and local shocks matter,” David Laborde, director of the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization's Food and Agriculture Organization's Division of Agricultural Economics and Policy, told Arab News. .

“Now, especially for the Middle East, I think the global angle is important because the Middle East imports a lot of food. Even if you don't have a (climate) shock at home, if you don't have a drought or a flood at home — if it happened in Pakistan, if it happened in India, if it happened in Canada — the Middle East will feel it.”

The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World report has been produced annually since 1999 by FAO, the International Fund for Agricultural Development, the United Nations Children's Fund, the World Food Program and the World Health Organization to monitor global progress towards ending hunger.

During a recent event at UN headquarters in New York, the authors of the report emphasized the urgent need for creative and equitable solutions to address the financial shortfall to help those nations facing severe hunger and malnutrition exacerbated by climate change.

In addition to climate change, the report found that factors such as conflict and economic recessions are becoming more frequent and severe, influencing the accessibility of a healthy diet, unhealthy food environments and inequality.

Indeed, food insecurity and malnutrition are intensifying due to persistent food price inflation, which has undermined economic progress globally.

“There is also an indirect effect that we should not neglect – how climate shock interacts with conflict,” Laborde said.

In North Africa, for example, negative climate shocks can lead to more conflict, “either because people start competing for natural resources, access to water, or just because you may also have some people in your area who don't they have other things to do,” he said.

“There are no jobs, they can't work on their farm and so they can join insurgencies or other elements.”

At the end of 2021, G20 countries committed to take $100 billion of unused special drawing rights held in high-income countries' central banks and allocate them to middle- and low-income countries.

Since then, however, this promised amount has fallen by $13 billion, with the countries with the worst economic conditions receiving less than 1% of this support.

Saudi Arabia is one of the countries to have exceeded its 20% pledge, along with Australia, Canada, China, France and Japan, while others have failed to reach 10% or stopped pledging altogether.

“Saudi Arabia is a very large state in the Middle East, so what they're doing is important, but they also have a financial capacity that many other countries don't have,” Laborde said.

“It may be through their STDs. It can also be through their sovereign fund, because where you invest matters and how you invest matters to make the world more sustainable. So I will say yes, prioritizing investments in low- and middle-income countries in food and nutrition security and related programs can be important.

Although the prevalence of malnutrition in Saudi Arabia has decreased in recent years, the report shows that the rate of stunting among children has actually increased by 1.4% in the past 10 years.

There has also been an increase in rates of overweight children, obesity and anemia in women as the population continues to grow. In this sense, it is not so much a lack of food, but a lack of healthy eating habits.

“Saudi Arabia is a good example where I would say traditional hunger and lack of food … is becoming less of a problem, but other forms of malnutrition are actually becoming what's important,” Laborde said.

In 2023, an estimated 2.33 billion people worldwide faced moderate or severe food insecurity, and one in 11 faced hunger, exacerbated by various factors such as economic decline and climate change.

Accessibility of healthy diets is also a critical issue, particularly in low-income countries, where more than 71% of the population cannot afford adequate nutrition.

In countries like Saudi Arabia, where overnutrition is a growing problem, Laborde suggests that adequate investment in nutrition and health education, as well as policy adaptation, may be the way forward.

While the Kingdom continues to extend support to countries in crisis, including Palestine, Sudan and Yemen, through its humanitarian arm KSrelief, these states continue to face dire conditions. Gaza, in particular, suffered as a result of the war with Israel.

“Even before the start of the conflict, especially at the end of last year, the situation in Palestine was complicated, both in terms of the agricultural system (and) population density. There was already a problem of malnutrition,” Laborde said.

“Now, something that's true everywhere, in Sudan, in Yemen, in Palestine, when you start adding conflicts and military operations, the population suffers a lot because you can effectively destroy production. Destroy access to water. But people can't even go to the store when the truck or ship bringing food is cut off.”

While Palestine and Sudan are the extreme cases, there are still an estimated 733 million people worldwide facing hunger, marking a continuation of the high levels seen over the past three years.

“On the ground, we work with the World Food Program (and) other organizations, aimed at bringing food to the needy people in Palestine,” Laborde said of the FAO's work. “Before the conflict and after, we will also work on rebuilding things that need to be rebuilt. But without peace, there are limited things we can do.”

FAO helps food-insecure nations by bringing better seeds, livestock, technologies and irrigation solutions to develop production systems, while working to protect animals from pests and diseases, providing veterinary services and creating incentives for countries to adopt better policies.

The report's projections for 2030 suggest that some 582 million people will continue to suffer from chronic undernourishment, half of them in Africa. This mirrors the levels seen in 2015 when the SDGs were adopted, indicating an ongoing plateau.

The report highlights the need to create better financial distribution systems, under this year's theme: “Financing to End Hunger, Food Insecurity and All Forms of Malnutrition”.

“In 2022, there were many headlines about global hunger, but today, it has more or less disappeared, when the number and people who are hungry have not disappeared,” Laborde said, referring to the negative impact of the war in Ukraine . on world food prices.

“We have to say that we are not fulfilling the promises made by the decision-makers. Today's world produces enough food, so it's much more about how we distribute it, how we give access. It is a man-made problem, and therefore it should be a man-made solution.”