Food Security in India Essay Example Tight supply pushed up the prices of wheat to unprecedented heights, significantly affecting food inflation across the globe including India. Surging food grain prices and worsening global supplies are now bringing the domestic food crisis to the boil Food availability and agriculture in India has been largely related to the vagaries of monsoon. In the past concentrated efforts were made to achieve food security by increasing food grain production. The Green Revolution was a step towards attaining Food Security. Get Help With Your Essay Jun 19, · Long Essay on Food Security in India Words in English. Long Essay on Food Security in India is usually given to classes 7, 8, 9, and Food the most elementary need of any human being, has always been promised to the segment at the bottom of societal pyramid. Yet food security remains a distant dream in our blogger.comted Reading Time: 12 mins
Food Security in India Essay for Students of UPSC, PO, PTE, Civil Service
These factors include a broad spectrum of socioeconomic issues with great influence on farmers and on the impoverished in particular.
With lack of irrigation water, infrastructure and investments, and low availability of micro-finance combined with dependency on few multinational suppliers, crop production is unlikely to increase in those regions where it is needed the most, unless major policy changes and investments take place.
These constraints are further compounded by conflicts and corruption. Agricultural prices are forecast to remain well above the levels of the first half of In addition, a production short of demand, a greater geographical inequity in production and demand, combined with possibly more extreme weather and subsequent speculation in food markets, could generate much greater price volatility than before.
The availability of food within a specific country can be guaranteed in two ways: either by food production in the country itself or by trade. Increase in productivity can come about by using innovative soil and moisture conservation techniques, e. The Green Revolution helped to increase production in cereals in some regions, but the technologies involved had their own limitations. Developments on the demand side require increase in production essay on food security in india those regions with the highest economic growth or population increase.
The majority of these regions will be essay on food security in india emerging economies in Africa and Asia. Nowadays, Africa is especially dependent on food imports.
Food production in this essay on food security in india is lagging behind due to limited research investments and the problems for farmers to use the appropriate inputs in their production process.
The world regions are sharply divided in terms of their capacity to use science in promoting agricultural productivity in order to achieve food security and reduce poverty and hunger. In Africa, the levels of productivity are much lower and their growth has also been slower than in Asia. One of the major options for significantly raising crop production is increasing the use of mineral fertilisers.
A major challenge is to find ways of making fertiliser available to smallholders at affordable prices. There is also a need for holistic approaches to soil fertility management that embraces the full range of driving factors and consequences of soil degradation. This would include the integration of mineral and organic sources of nutrients, thereby using locally available sources of inputs and maximising their use efficiency, while reducing dependency upon prices of commercial fertilisers and pesticides.
The use of perennials, intercropping and agroforestry systems, such as the use of nitrogen fixating leguminous trees, are ways to increase nutrient availability, and enhance water availability and pest control, in a more sustainable manner. Aftergrowth in expansion of irrigated area decreased and it is assumed this trend will continue in the near future. One of the reasons is that the areas most suitable for irrigation are already used, leading to higher construction costs in new areas.
Current irrigation systems could be improved by investing in water control and delivery, automation, monitoring and staff training. In most African regions, the major challenge is not the lack of water, but unpredictable and highly variable rainfall patterns with occurrences of dry spells every two years causing crop failure. This high uncertainty and variability influence the risk adverse behaviour of smallholder farmers. Rarely are investments made in soil management and fertility, crop varieties, tillage practices and even labour in order to avoid losses in case of total crop failure.
Managing the extreme rainfall variability over time and space can provide supplemental irrigation water to overcome dry periods and prevent crop failure. In combination with improved soil, this should reduce the risk of total crop failure and enhance the profitability of investments in crop management, for example, fertilisers, labour and crop varieties. Increasing crop canopy coverage reduces evapotranspiration from the soil, improving soil moisture and the provision of water for the crop.
This option has become more and more important with increasing transport possibilities and storing capacities and the growing challenges faced by some countries in their domestic production, including because of limitations in available cropland. International trade in agricultural products has expanded more rapidly than global agricultural GDP. An increasing share of global agricultural exports originates from developed countries. The EU countries account for most of the global growth.
Another perspective of trade is the purchase of land abroad for food production. Responding to recent food crises, a number of countries have started to purchase land abroad for cultivation of — crops needed to support domestic demand. This is seen as a long-term solution to the high prices of agriculture commodities and increasing demand for Agroforestry products such as palm oil.
Among the most active countries owning, leasing or concessioning farmland overseas are China, India, Japan, Saudi Arabia, essay on food security in india, South Korea and United Arab Emirates. The total area of overseas farmland in different countries was estimated at 5.
A major reason for instability in food supply is high fluctuation in food prices price volatility. Volatile prices lead to poor investment strategies of producers and immediate impacts on consumers, especially in developing countries where consumers spend a large share of their income on food.
Another source of instability is conflicts, which increase food supply risks. Trade policies that limit market access, increase the volatility of commodity prices, unfairly subsidise developed country exports and constrain the trade policy flexibility of the developing world affect the stability and security as well as overall economic well-being of developing countries.
The impacts of these restrictions varied from panic-buying to the cultivation of smaller areas due to high input costs and the expectation of low product prices. These restrictions even increased price volatility of food products on the world essay on food security in india, thereby decreasing the food security of other countries.
With open markets, essay on food security in india, developing countries are very vulnerable to fluctuations in global food supply and prices and temporary protection of their own agricultural markets is promoted for these countries. Conflicts greatly increase the risk of food supply instability.
Countries in conflict and post-conflict situations tend to be food insecure, with more than 20 per cent of the population, and in many cases far more, lacking access to adequate food.
Accessibility to food refers not only to physical access but also affordability. Access to markets includes transportation of commodities and its costs and the transmission of price developments to producers. Poor transmission of price incentives to producers results in increasing the gap between consumers and producers especially as diets change. As urbanisation increases, large urban markets are created and with this the scope of the establishment of big supermarket chains increases.
This has implications for the entire food supply chain. Supermarkets have become an emerging force in South Asia, particularly in urban India, since the mids, essay on food security in india. The growth and power of international food corporations affect the opportunities of small agricultural producers in developing countries.
Market entry is often barred to the majority of producers because of stringent safety and quality standards of food retailers. Trade and urbanisation affect consumer preferences. The rapid diversification of the urban diet cannot be met by the traditional food supply chain in the hinterland of many developing countries.
Consequently, importing food to satisfy the changing food demand could be relatively easier and less costly than acquiring the same food from domestic sources. In Asia, essay on food security in india rice-eating societies are consuming increasing quantities of wheat in the form of bread, cakes, pastry and other products. Countries that traditionally [imported rice for meeting food shortfalls may now be shifting towards increasing levels of Wheat imports.
This trend is also evident in the import of other temperate products like vegetables, milk and dairy products and temperate fruit. The overall result is that we are beginning to see a homogenisation of food tastes across the globe, but with regional variations.
Poor connections between urban and rural areas hinder price transmissions towards local markets, broadening the gap between urban demand and rural production in increasing demand for traditional products or for product diversification. The lack of access to markets is most evident in Africa, although large parts of Latin America and Asia are also experiencing long transport hours to reach markets.
Consequently, domestic prices do not always follow international prices as an FAO report pointed out in The periods of rising real prices were generally associated with real exchange rate devaluations. Relaxation of government controls over prices and market systems also led to gains in producer prices in some cases. In other instances, import liberalisation appears to have contributed to a decline in the real domestic prices of some commodities.
Consequently, global shortages of food and feed that lead to global price increases are not followed by production increases at the local level. Accessibility to food is also determined by the long-term trend in food prices which is a different issue from price volatility. In food prices were driven by a combination of rising fuel costs, production of biofuels, and unfavourable weather conditions, with trade restrictions boosting upward price pressures.
As the cost, and subsequent use, of fertiliser is strongly correlated with price, a potentially higher oil price would lower the use of fertiliser or further increase the food price.
Fuel price is one of the main determining factors for fisheries. Rising energy prices have a strong impact on capture as well as aquaculture for the production and transport of fish feed and lead to higher costs during the processing, transport particularly air freight and distribution of fish products.
Small-scale fisheries, which depend on outboard motors and small diesel engines, have especially suffered from the spiralling rise in fuel prices. While a higher oil price increases demand for biofuels, essay on food security in india, there is a catch: the agricultural commodities used nowadays or biofuels were previously used for feed and fodder; in the circumstances, demand for agricultural commodities as for factor inputs increases in this case.
The overall decline in food prices is not expected to be so marked because of biofuel use. Most of the quantitative and qualitative indicators of food security at the household level are linked to the poverty issue.
As Amartya Sen points out, the poor do not have adequate means or entitlements to secure food, even when food is locally or regionally available, essay on food security in india. It is interesting to note that merely increase in income does not necessarily ensure improved nutritional status, essay on food security in india.
Access to gainful employment, suitable technologies and other productive resources are important factors influencing undernutrition. Though, overall, soaring food prices are blamed for their impacts on human vulnerability, there are two sides to this picture. Increasing food prices do have a positive effect on net food-selling households FAO,augmenting their incomes and allowing more possibilities for farmers to afford investments in production inputs. This underlines the need to minimise short-term price volatility and stimulate slow increases in long- term food prices, in order to enhance investments in the agricultural system and bridge the gap between developed and developing countries as well as between rural food producing and urban food consuming regions.
Ideally, these developments should take environmental aspects into account to achieve sustainable agricultural systems that will meet the food demand of all the world citizens and eradicate hunger.
However, increasing yield and food supply without simply continuing the conventional expansion of cropland and rangeland and use of fertilisers and pesticides—at the cost of biodiversity and future generations—will require major investments and essay on food security in india of food energy considerations in the entire food production and essay on food security in india chain.
As already mentioned in discussing the problems of nutrition patterns, much requires to be accomplished to acquire equitability in this regard. Apart from quantitative aspect, qualitative aspects of diet such as consumption habits and nutritional needs also affect food security. In the absence of adequate attention to qualitative aspects of food, essay on food security in india, the ability of the individual to sustain the benefits of development gets affected. i The positive and negative impacts on non-communicable diseases of intensive production systems, not only in terms of health e.
nitrite in vegetables, heavy metals in irrigation water and manure, pesticide usebut also in terms of dietary quality e. leaner meats in intensive poultry production. ii The effects of longer food chains, in particular of longer storage and transport routes, such as the higher risk of -deterioration even essay on food security in india most of this may be bacterial and hence not a factor in chronic diseasesand the use and misuse of conserving agents and contaminants; and. In the short term, the volatile prices can be decreased by price regulation and creation of larger cereal stocks to buffer the tight markets of food commodities and the subsequent risks of speculation, essay on food security in india.
Safety nets need to be provided to alleviate impacts of rising prices and food shortage. In the middle term, efforts should be made to develop alternatives for feeds for animals and fish.
Finding alternative feed sources provides a huge potential for increasing the availability of cereal for human consumption. For other feed sources to become a sustainable alternative to the current use of cereals, their exploitation must not be resource- demanding. This poses a big challenge, since most of the easily available feed sources have already been fully exploited, although some alternatives still exist.
By using discards, waste and other post-harvest losses, the supply of animal and fish feed can be increased and be sustained without expanding current production, simply by increasing energy efficiency and conservation in the food supply chain.
Essay for SSC CGL tier 3 # essay for SSC chsl tier 2 : FOOD SECURITY IN INDIA
, time: 3:14Essay on Food Security
Food Security in India Essay Example Tight supply pushed up the prices of wheat to unprecedented heights, significantly affecting food inflation across the globe including India. Surging food grain prices and worsening global supplies are now bringing the domestic food crisis to the boil Essay on food and nutrition security (India) In fact, the real issue today is not the availability of food but of its affordability by the poor the issue is also of food and nutrition security based on the access to a diet of high nutritional quality. From this point of view, the modern concept of food security has become rather broad-‘ based, encompassing livelihood security and poverty alleviation as means to Estimated Reading Time: 3 mins Food availability and agriculture in India has been largely related to the vagaries of monsoon. In the past concentrated efforts were made to achieve food security by increasing food grain production. The Green Revolution was a step towards attaining Food Security. Get Help With Your Essay
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