“The right to food is the right to a dignified life. When people go hungry, their very existence is threatened.” – Josette Sheeran, former executive director of The World Food Program.
Despite claiming to be an agrarian society, Pakistan has an unfortunate history of food insecurity, with the Global Hunger Index (GHI) ranking it 92 of 116 countries under consideration. This is especially troubling for a country whose very foundation was laid with the promise of improving the living standards of minorities in Hindu-majority India. Yet, over 75 years since Partition, dwindling health and malnutrition continue to plague the country, corroding the very basis upon which the nation stands.
In a statement issued last year, the GHI declared over 26% of Pakistan’s population to be food insecure, an estimated 62.4 million people. Similarly, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the U.N. estimated 9.3 percent of Pakistanis to be undernourished, with Sindh and Balochistan reporting the highest rates of undernourishment within the country. The worst-affected are the most vulnerable segments of the population, with UNICEF stating 38% of children under-five in Pakistan exhibit signs of stunted growth. An additional 17% of children under five are reported to be suffering from wasting, or extreme malnutrition. The deprivation begins in the womb, with two-thirds of Pakistan women, per UNICEF, lacking adequate access to nutrition during pregnancies, boosting birth defects, developmental delays and increased rates of both maternal and infant mortality.
Successive governments have highlighted the issue, vowing to address it, to little avail. In his inaugural speech as prime minister, Imran Khan had vowed to make stunted growth a central plank of his government’s healthcare efforts but the issue remains unaddressed. Similarly, incumbent Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has vowed to launch a nationwide program to overcome child malnutrition, but there has been little progress on implementing his plans. Key to resolving the concerns is food security, but Pakistan’s agriculture sector has struggled to modernize, with annual crops increasingly impacted by erratic weather conditions—such as the 2022 floods—triggered by climate change.
Pakistan is also a water stressed country, with indications it is rapidly moving toward “scarcity,” reducing available resources for agriculture. Despite this, farmers have resisted shifting to the more efficient drip irrigation method, preferring to continue utilizing the canal system that has persisted for decades and facilitates water losses. Pest control is another longstanding issue, with many crops damaged annually due to inefficient fumigation policies.
Further boosting food insecurity is uneven distribution, with rural areas often receiving far less attention than their urban counterparts, increasing under-nutrition in villages and towns. The country has also repeatedly failed to shift production to crops consumed by the country’s majority, such as pulses, in favor of cash crops such as tobacco and sugarcane, leaving consumer prices at the whims of international forces. According to the Pakistan Economic Survey, Pakistan produces just 0.9 million tons of pulses against consumption of 1.5 million tons, with the difference made up for through imports. This is a particularly worrying concern for a country in economic turmoil, as food inflation plays a major role in reducing the purchasing power of citizens.
Even among crops that the country produces in sufficient numbers for self-sustainability, such as wheat, poor governance in the form of allowing exports without factoring in domestic demands has curtailed availability for the public. The recent past, especially, has seen record levels of inflation, forcing the underprivileged to choose between paying for food or utilities, with reports mounting of poorer segments of society preferring to eat a single meal daily just to survive.
Unfortunately, there are no easy fixes. Pakistan’s struggle with nutrition and food availability hinges on a multitude of systemic problems that require the devising of long-term policies aimed at boosting self-sustainability and modernization. This requires allocation of resources aimed at altering irrigation practices; mitigating climate change; and reforming governance. Once the government initiates such policies, on the pattern set by many global and regional counterparts, the country’s malnutrition issues would slowly dwindle and its citizenry assured of healthy, more fulfilling lives.