Report: Hunger affects 1 in 5 people in Africa as climate change, conflict takes toll
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00:00Food security in Africa is so precarious that one in five people on the continent
00:04regularly struggle to find enough to eat in 2023. A new report has raised the alarm about the effect
00:12that the rash of global crises over the last few years have had on rising levels of malnutrition
00:18all around the world, but particularly in Africa. The Food and Agricultural Organization reckons
00:24that globally about 582 million people will be chronically undernourished by 2030, and about
00:31a half of them will be on the African continent. Now with me now for more is Director David Laborde
00:39from the FAO. Director David, thank you so much for making time to break this down for us. So
00:46first of all, Africa, 54 countries, a vast range of climates, economies, communities,
00:52practices. Why has this incredibly diverse continent found it harder than other regions
00:59to bounce back from the effect that recent global shocks that we've seen have had on
01:06nutrition targets? So the starting point is unfortunately the high level of poverty on the
01:13continent, because food insecurity of course is accelerated by climate shock, by conflict,
01:19but poverty and inequalities is really what created this fertile ground for hunger,
01:25inequality within countries, inequality across countries. And unfortunately for some countries
01:30in Africa also, you just don't face one shock, but multiple shock. The same country will be
01:36impacted by a drought, by conflict, and last but not least, sometimes they are cross-fertilizing
01:42them, meaning a climate shock lead to more competition for water or displacement of
01:47population that will lead to conflict. And that's this unfortunate group of effects,
01:54if you want, that put the continent on the frontline of hunger. So when we're talking
01:59about hunger, what is the effect of malnutrition beyond the immediacy of not having enough to eat?
02:08Does it have an impact on a region or community or country's longer term prospects?
02:15Yes, because the food we eat, the food that mother eat, the food that kids eat,
02:20is about building human capital, good brain, good muscles. And so the food security or the
02:25food insecurity of today has a cost in five years, in 10 years, in 15 years. And in some time,
02:31it's even more complex than what we can guess, meaning that if when you are a kid, you lack food,
02:38lack food, your probability to be obese later increase, because if you grew up with a starvation
02:47or with a lack of calories, your body trying to accumulate more. So we have really this problem
02:52of double burden of malnutrition, that is not only today, but tomorrow, and take very different
02:57shapes and as a high economic cost, actually, for countries over time. So when it comes to Africa,
03:03specifically, what do you recommend should be the priority in trying to tackle this,
03:11well, the nutritional crisis the continent is seeing?
03:14So there are two main directions. One is to make sure that there is social safety net that will
03:20protect the poor population when these shocks happen, and also to design them in a way that
03:25protect rural population that can be impacted by climate shock, but also making sure that
03:32healthy diets are provided to the population. And for this, investing in agriculture is key,
03:38because Africa is also marked with a low level of agricultural productivity when there is a
03:42high potential. And by growing better food, more food, the continent will be better prepared to
03:49deal with this. The main problem is getting the money to do it. Thank you so much for that,
03:54Director David Laborde from the Food and Agricultural Organization.