ONE BILLION NOT SERVED: HOW THE UN FOOD AND AGRICULTURE

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SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: EAID EAGR SOCI PHUM FAO UN
SUBJECT: ONE BILLION NOT SERVED: HOW THE UN FOOD AND AGRICULTURE
ORGANIZATION AND U.S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE COUNT THE HUNGRY

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Summary
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1. According to separate studies published in 2008 by the U.S.
Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the UN's Food and
Agriculture Organization (FAO),there are approximately one
billion hungry, or "food insecure," people in the world. Both
organizations have since predicted that this number will likely
rise during 2009. This cable is intended to provide background
on the methodology used to calculate this figure, and describe
the inherent challenges involved in trying to reach precise
figures. A better understanding of the statistical shortcomings
associated with this work may help target our policies more
effectively to address global food security issues. End Summary

Hunger Statistics - The "SOFI"
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2. In June 2008, FAO released its latest edition of 'The State
of Food Insecurity in the World (SOFI)' which calculated that
923 million people in 112 developing countries were food
insecure - an increase of 75 million over the last usable data
set collected in 2002. The USDA's 2007 'Food Security
Assessment,' by comparison (published in 2008),estimated that
982 million people in 70 countries were food insecure - an
increase of 133 million over the same time period. In these
reports, "food insecure" refers to the absence of stable,
readily-available access to the required daily caloric intake.
These reports cite rising food prices, the global economic
downturn, demands for biofuel, production and distribution
shortfalls, ongoing armed conflicts, and climate change as
causes for these increases.


3. Political figures often cite the one billion figure in
calling for increased global attention to food security issues.
FAO Director General Jacques Diouf frequently uses this estimate
to draw attention to the issue and is currently using the figure
to seek support for a proposed summit on food security in
November, 2009. He recently used the figure in a Financial
Times interview, and in recent correspondence with world leaders
seeking support for his summit proposal. What is rarely
debated, or closely examined, however, is the specific
methodology behind the hunger figures. There are a number of
ways to calculate world food insecurity, none being an exact
science.

The 2008 SOFI
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4. The SOFI estimates the total number of people who are
considered chronically food insecure in a given year, extracting
the median from a three-year data set. The SOFI is printed
annually, although 2002 data had been recylced up to the 2008
report, at which time FAO used new methods for counting caloric
intake. There was also a six-year pause of new population data
collection between 2002 and 2008 while the UN Population
Division developed new population estimation methods, which were
released in 2006. The 2008 SOFI estimated that 923 million
people were food insecure in 112 developing countries.
Following a revision of the 2002 estimate to 848 million, the
figures show a nearly nine percent increase in the number of
hungry people over this six year period.

FAO Methodologies
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5. To reach their hunger figure, FAO starts with an estimate of
the total amount of food in a country for the time frame, taking
into account food production, food stocks, external food aid
received, and imports. From these estimates, FAO determines the
total amount of calories available in a country. FAO then
ascertains the availability of food by determining the
purchasing power of the population - figuring how many people
can afford to procure their daily food needs. The input for
this comes from FAO-designed surveys of caloric intake and
incomes, which are administered by host governments. An average
per capita calorie availability is calculated, then surveys are
used to find who falls below the average income rate, calorie
consumption rate, and food accessibility. The people at the
lowest end of the scale, those who consume less than the minimal
daily energy requirement (MDER) of 1,800 calories, are
considered food insecure. In addition to this number, access to
calories that are essential rather than empty (i.e.,
'nutritious'),is also calculated to find how many people do not
have access to minimal nutrients for a healthy diet and -
considered 'undernourished.'


6. The methods to collect and analyze data used by FAO have
been criticized by the U.S. Government Accountability Office
(GAO) and USDA. In May 2008, GAO published at the request of

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Senators Feingold and Voinovich, and Representative Payne, a
report, `International Food Security; Insufficient Efforts by
Host Governments and Donors Threaten Progress to Halve Hunger in
Sub-Saharan Africa by 2015.' (ref GAO-08-06, May 2008) In this
report, GAO does not dispute that food insecurity is rising, but
does note shortfalls in FAO's methodologies. Likewise, in its
2007 Food Security Assessment USDA criticized FAO's data inputs.



7. The lack of reliability in the final number stems from
issues found in the data surveys, and statistical methodology.
The surveys FAO relies upon are submitted by national
governments, which may over- or under-report data on food
stocks, income, and caloric consumption, depending on internal
politics, how much aid they desire, or the public face they wish
to present. For countries that do not submit a data survey, or
for which obtaining one is politically difficult, FAO estimates
externally the data for those countries as a group. This can
lead to inaccurate input for the group, as data is lumped
together and estimated for some countries to which a substantial
amount of food aid has been delivered, i.e., Afghanistan, Iraq,
and Somalia. Thus, in come cases substantial amounts of food
aid is not accurately represented in the statistics. In
addition, the three-year timeframe also misses short-term
impacts on food security such as wars, price spikes, and
droughts.


8. FAO calculates caloric intake as an average across an entire
country and does not take into account distribution of food or
incomes. An urban center often has better food accessibility
and higher incomes than rural areas, inflating the national
averages and missing the rural poor. In addition, averaging
food availability distorts problems with nutrition distribution;
certain foods and types of nutrients may not be available across
an entire country, leaving some people with enough calories to
be over the MDER line, but without proper nutrition. This leads
to underestimation of both food insecurity and undernourishment
in countries with adequate food available in some places but
inadequate distribution networks.


9. In 2006, the UN and FAO revised their global and
country-specific population estimates. The new population
estimates, with large increases in Asia, especially in China and
India, increased the 2008 population estimates. These new
population numbers, along with the revised caloric measurements,
increased the number of food insecure people in 2008. At the
same time, the changes decreased the number of food insecure for
2002 and 1998 - estimations which were based on outdated and
less-complete data from those years. While the method is more
sound now, these revisions led to a 75 million food-insecure
spike over the past few years and raises questions about what
the trend would have looked like had the methods been in place
years ago.

USDA Food Security Assessment - 2007
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10. In its `Food Security Assessment, 2007,' USDA estimated a
total of 982 million as food insecure in 70 countries - an
increase of 133 million. This is a higher total number and
percentage increase than FAO (with a smaller number of countries
comprising the base data). USDA's figure primarily reflects a
higher MDER of 2,100 calories than FAO's 1,800. Besides the
higher MDER, however, there are other differences between the
two methodologies.

USDA Methodologies
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11. USDA takes information on commodity prices and land use in
a country, adds it to FAO data on fertilizer, labor, and
technology use to create an estimation called food production.
This is then added to information from other sources regarding
capital inflow, exports, food aid, and food import prices to
create a total consumption number for a country; essentially
estimating how many calories are available in a country and how
available they are to people. Then the total number of calories
needed for a country is determined based on population size
times a 2,100 calorie requirement (300 calories higher than
FAO's 1,800). The countrywide calorie requirement, minus the
calories available divided by the population, equals the
estimation of per capita food gap. The gap is then used to
estimate the number of food insecure people. This is further
applied to income distribution numbers to find the number of
hungry people according to income levels.


12. USDA measures and revises these numbers annually, and
factors in both chronic and emergency food insecurity. They
base their estimates on the preliminary information for the
year, then revise the estimates when they receive actual

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numbers. This allows USDA to take into account short-term
causes of food insecurity, including droughts, economic shocks,
and conflicts. The FAO estimate, on the other hand, is based on
data averaged over three years, and represents what it calls
chronic food insecurity.


13. The USDA relies upon FAO's caloric intake surveys provided
by governments and which may contain incomplete or inaccurate
data. However, to guard against shortcomings, USDA trims the
FAO list from 112 countries to 70, and focuses on the lowest
income counties for which data is available and which are
recipients of U.S. food aid. In addition, USDA uses net capital
inflow, exports, distribution, aid donations, and food import
data from multiple sources including USAID, NGOs, the World Bank
and the IMF, to create overall food availability data for a
country, rather than relying solely on FAO surveys.

Conclusion
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14. No one doubts the number of food insecure people is rising,
and will continue to do so in the near-term. Nonetheless, an
estimation is far from an exact science, and will only be as
good as the data used in its preparation. Clearly, improvements
can be made to strengthen data collection methods and training,
an effort which some countries and organizations are already
undertaking. In 2008, the Gates Foundation pledged $5.6 million
over two years to help 17 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa
improve their statistics-collection and data on population and
food, including Ethiopia, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Mozambique,
Nigeria, and Rwanda. In addition, FAO and USDA are undertaking
a partnership to produce a joint SOFI in 2009, which may help
strengthen both estimations further. Better information
gathering should lead to more reliable numbers and, in turn,
more effective programs.
BRUDVIGLA