Michele.

Found an article, not truly related with malnutrition, but with food surplus redistribution that may be is of interest.

Reference is:

Midgley, Jane L. The logics of surplus food redistribution. Journal of Enviromental Planning and Management.

DOI: 10.1080/09640568.2013.848192

Hope it helps.

Juan.

Thank you Juan!

Hi Michele,

There is mixed empirical evidence on the relationship between agricultural production and/or development and poverty reduction. In general, economic growth that is driven by agricultural transformation in resource poor countries has proved to be up to 11 times more effective in alleviating poverty. In addition such growth has seen corresponding increases in non - agricultural sectors creating extra employment for more poor people (FAO, 2012). More employment entails increased access to food.

Supporters of agricultural production and modernization say that agricultural transformation can increase food security and reduce poverty, a situation Pinstrup (2012), refers to as “double focus”. He cites the green revolution where use of improved varieties, access to markets and affordable fertilizers resulted in increased cereal production which in turn led to gains for both farmers and consumers. Surplus produce was sold on the market resulting in increased incomes for farmers whereas consumers benefited from low food prices due to increases in food supply.

Between the period 1990 and 2010, Bangladesh recorded massive successes. The agriculture sector grew by an average of 3.3% per year, as a result of improved rice performance. Contributions from both public and private sector initiatives, yielded positive results. Small scale farmers had access to credit which helped them acquire agricultural inputs. Public spending on capital projects like irrigation infrastructure enabled farmers to increase agricultural productivity. Government of Bangladesh further committed resources to health and education which accelerated economic growth in the country. The implications for the small scale farmers was that considerable poverty reduction and higher incomes was attained for the poor. Further evidence has shown that increases in incomes for the poor, usually results in increased consumption of variety of foods like animal proteins, fruits and vegetables which ultimately improves their nutritional status (FAO, 2012 and 2013).

Vietnam also registered one of the best agricultural performances of 4% per year in the period between 1990 and 2010, leading to increased food production and corresponding reduction in malnutrition and poverty levels (FAO, 2012).

References:

1. FAO. (2012). “The State of Food Insecurity in the World 2012: Economic growth is necessary but not sufficient to accelerate reduction of hunger and malnutrition”.

http://www.fao.org/publications/sofi/en/

(Accessed on 20.12.2013)

2. FAO. (2013). “The State of Food Insecurity in the World 2013: The multiple dimensions of food security”.

http://www.fao.org/publications/sofi/en/

(Accessed on 20.12.2013)

3. Pinstrup, A. P. (2012). “Contemporary Food Policy Challenges and Opportunities: A Political Economy Perspective”. Paper prepared for presentation at the 56th AARES annual conference, Fremantle, Western Australia, February7-10, 2012.

http://dyson.cornell.edu/faculty_sites/pinstrup/pdfs/2012ContempFoodChallOpps.pdf

(Accessed on 20.12.2013)

Dear Christopher,

thank you very much for your very detailed answer and references. From what you say I understand that the role of agricultural productivity is not in stimulating growth per se, but perhaps to lift the poor. This somehow must be reflected into a better distribution of income and wealth. If so, I believe that efforts should be put into fostering this aspect as well as increasing productivity. Is this a topic you are currently working on?

Hi Michele,

I am working on food security discourse. Agricultural productivity is among the concepts of food security. As regards productivity and stimulating growth, it is actually both. The rationale is that growth should trickle down to the poor. However, this is not always the case. Factors must be put in place like social protection and improved access to public resources like health and education to enable the poor participate in the growing economy.

Thanks Cristopher,

this is exactly what I mean. Economic growth not necessarily will lift the poor out of poverty. I do not know in African countries, but in USA and Europe there is plenty of evidence that the gap between rich and poor has widened (in fact Picketty wrote a very popular book about it). So I believe is very important to look at what happens to income/wealth distribution. Are you a PhD student at Reading? I used to work there in SAPD.

Hi Michele,

In Africa, the situation is the same. Inequality is increasing at an alarming rate. Good to know that you are from Reading! Were you teaching here?

No, I am not a PhD Student yet. Hopefully soon.

I was a lecturer in the Ag Econ department from 2008 to 2011.

Nice.

Is that what you are still doing in MODUL University, Vienna?

Right now, insecurity (civil unrest, wars) are as much a cause of food insecurity that climate vagaries. Of course, if population increases, production has to follow, but this is not a guarantee that people will have access to food!

R

There are many factors that affect Food security such as agricultural productivity, climate variables, GDP per capita, inflation, population growth, and land under cereal production. All these factors are significant in explaining the indicators of food security.

I suggest to consult the following references:

Belloumi, M., 2014. Investigating the Impact of Climate Change on Agricultural Production in Eastern and Southern African Countries. AGRODEP Working Paper 0003. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute.

Belloumi, M. 2014. Investigating the Linkage Between Climate Variables and Food Security in ESA Countries. AGRODEP Working Paper 0004. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute.

http://www.agrodep.org/workingpaper

Thank you Mounir! I will check those publications!

graziano

Michele, as you will find, this is an age-old issue, yet highly relevant today as we are yet to achieve the productivity growth that could be achieved in several developing countries. Translating food production into nutritional outcomes has been a challenge. Typical example is India where the 'green revolution ' was achieved in the early eighties and food self sufficiency was achieved at the national level , still household food security is remains an issue. Further food is only one ingredient in solving malnutrition issue. Health, sanitation, and care. There is quite a bit of literature on this. These interventions have to be integrated with the food production goals . This is the reason for the renewed emphasis on Agriculture for Nutrition. You might want to look into the literature related to this; fortification, nutrition value chains, and social safety-nets connecting the agricultural- nutrition programming. There are several ( often overlapping ) programs at the international level that are bringing these issues to the forefront. Yet at the country level the institutional architecture for agricultural-nutrition programming is still missing in most of the developing countries. Until this happens and until we strengthen these system, we will be faced with the challenge of translating international / global results into action at the policy and program level within the countries.

Dear Suresh, thank you very much for your answer. Indeed I have made some progress in the literature and found interesting research which stresses the importance of access to water, sanitation, women education. I found this extremely interesting, as increasing food availability may also have large environmental costs (e.g., land use change). Then I believe it is extremely important to have a system which guarantees that the food is translated into nutrition for poor people.

Glad to know you have looked into these issues already. Also maternal education is key as is shown in the recent Bangladesh example of drastic reduction in malnutrition.

Hi Michele,

I found this little piece from IDS makes interesting reading:

https://www.ids.ac.uk/publication/accelerating-reductions-in-undernutrition-what-can-nutrition-governance-tell-us

Hope it helps,

Chris.

Dear Michele,

Affordability of nutritious food plays a major role. I believe by looking at the past -- empirical evidence -- you plan to design for nutrition enhancement in future. Am I right?

We are told global warming has changed the nature of weather and that past weather does not predict the future weather. As agriculture is weather dependent, should we look for empirical evidence or develop models based on economics?

I would direct you to the classic research of Nobel prize winner Amartya Sen, who was the first to claim that food availability does not equal food access. He investigated the root cause of famiines, and found that lack of food production did not explain the famines (but entitlements did):

Sen, Amartya (1982). Poverty and famines: an essay on entitlement and deprivation. Oxford New York: Clarendon Press Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780198284635.

Dear Gerdien,

thank you very much for this. I indeed came across this reference (although have not read it yet). It is startling that I have not really been able to find anything more recent along this same line of investigation.

cheers,

g

A somewhat related and more recent article (2011) analyses the argument that "food security is impacted by social and political configurations around power over food, rather than the mere presence or absence of food in the vicinity of a hungry individual."

Patel RC (2012) Food Sovereignty: Power, Gender, and the Right to Food. PLoS Med 9(6): e1001223. doi:10.1371/journal.pmed.1001223

This line of research might also provide you with more empirical work. Interesting question, by the way!

Good luck!

Malnutrition is without any doubt one of the biggest problems in today's scenario, but reducing the incidence of malnutrition is one thing which requires more focused research. Increasing the food production only may not be sufficient, however, increase in food production along with enhancement in the nutritive value of the economic products might result in reducing the problem. In this context you can read the articles published by Cakmak, 2008 in plant and soil and by Chandel et al. 2010; these articles will give a more complete idea as they explore the potential of biofortification in eliminating malnutrition.

Good Luck..

In addition to Suresh, who I think has described very well what is involved in linking agricultural productivity with nutrition and the institutional machinery behind it. It is important to understand how we can measure it and link it to agricultural interventions.

I'm currently coordinating a project at Helen Keller International. Where we try to do just that!

The project is called, creating homestead agriculture for nutrition and gender equity (CHANGE).

Please see this link to a course on "Programming for Nutrition Outcomes" from the london school of tropical medicine, in which you get a quick introduction and a lot of literature references to the issue.

https://ble.lshtm.ac.uk/course/view.php?id=26

Particularly the sessions on Methods of nutritional assessment

https://ble.lshtm.ac.uk/pluginfile.php/20037/mod_resource/content/12/OER/PNO101/sessions/S1S3/PNO101_S1S3_010_010.html

and Agricutlure and Nutrition.

Best wishes,

Tom van Mourik

There are some really interesting points made above. One other one I would like to add is around food waste - how many calories do we actually loose from current levels of food production either post-harvest or post-purchase from retail stores. The latter is of course a problem of richer economies but looking at food chains, storage, transportation and so forth in all food production areas can help reduce waste in all economies and at the margin can help with the distribution of calories generally.

Dear Tom Van Mourik, June 28, 2014;

Thank you for the links. I just visited them and did not pursue them due to shortage of time. [ Now I am unable to spare 3 hours per module.] The second link deals with measuring malnutrition. Am I right?

I am interested in curing under nutrition rather than measuring the level of malnutrition.

Could you help me? Thanks in anticipation.

Households’ Dietary Diversity, Farm Income and Technical Efficiency Correlates: Empirical Evidence from Small-scale Farming Households in Nigeria

Adewumi, MO, Animashaun, JO

Agris on-line Papers in Economics and Informatics 12/2013; VI.

Edit

ABSTRACT This study examined the relationship among farming households’ technical efficiency, dietary diversity and
farm income in Kwara state, Nigeria. Respondents were randomly sampled from among the National Special
Programe for food security (NSPFS) beneficiaries and non benficiaies across the 3 geo-political zones
in the study area. Stochastic frontier model was used to estimate the respondents’ technical efficiency
while the dietary diversity score and farm income were analyzed with descriptive and inferential statistics.
The Pearson Product Moment Correlation (PPMC) was used to assess the level of relationship among
the indicators. The study revealed a significant linear relationship among households’ dietary diversity, farm
income and technical efficiency. While technical efficiency was inversely related to farm income (r = -0.278,
p = 0.01) and dietary diversity (r = -0.206, p = 0.05) on one hand, dietary diversity was positively related
to farm income (r = 0.307, p = 0.05). The study has two important implications; first, increasing farm income
may be of relevance if the goal of enhancing food security is pursued and benefits of technical efficiency
growth may not necessarily translate into enhanced farm income and dietary diversity. This study therefore
suggests the provision of infrastructures that would enable the farmers to access the benefits of improved
technical efficiency.

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jubril_Animashaun2/publication/258158531_Households_Dietary_Diversity_Farm_Income_and_Technical_Efficiency_Correlates_Empirical_Evidence_from_Small-scale_Farming_Households_in_Nigeria/file/72e7e531458c36d732.pdf?origin=publication_detail     https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jubril_Animashaun2

Article Households’ Dietary Diversity, Farm Income and Technical Eff...

In the paper, X5 is for fertilizer; and X6 is for herbicide. If more fertilizer and herbicide are used, technical efficiency increases. However, the farm income is bound to decrease. 

If the data is still available, could we have an analysis on the produce per hectare against the cost of fertilizer and herbicide per hectare?

Yes, I quite agree with you on the need to evaluate yield against cost of fertilizer and the cost of herbicides. A major set back may, however be the unavailability of the cost of the fertilizers and hjerbicides because the quantity in Liters/kg was used. But I think it would add more information to the trend of discussion if your suggestion is looked into.

file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Administrator/My%20Documents/Downloads/1310328806-Umar_2011AJEA224.pdf

===

The price 

of seed was $1.01kg-1in both years, herbicide was $7.43 per liter in 2008 and $8.45 per liter in 2009

===

Try with linear increase of $1 per year just to get a feel/ Let us use $13.45 per liter of herbicide. 

Please see page 15 of the following web page for 50-Kg bag cost of different fertilizers.

http://www.ifdc.org/R-D/Research/Nigeria_tech_Final111913/

Let us hope that we get the effect of fertilizer and herbicide on farm income. 

Alright thanks.

Awareness, Affordability, accessibility are no doubt important in improving the dietary intakes of individuals both in terms of quantity & quality of diets. But often, these does not result in positive change in the nutritional status of the communities. It is the mind set, cultural habits and attitude and practice that finally influences the dietary practices in a given community and there by their nutritional status.  

Dear Dr. Ginnela

I agree with the sentiments expressed. Is not the mindset of a community subject to the environment of the community? In particular when a rich family becomes a refugee family don't they eat the food provided in the refugee camp even if they had never eaten similar food?

The Government of India has enacted the 'Food Security Act' under which it is obligated to supply a minimum amount of grains and pulses to the weaker sections of India.

As the sole procurer and distributor of food the Government of India has immense control over the nutritional intake of the poor of India. We find nutritional deficiency among the poor and not the rich.

Shall we call upon the Agricultural researchers of India to develop new strains of popular food like wheat, rice, onion, potato, mango and other items that pack more micro-nutrients than the available crops? Such crops might need to be developed by genetic manipulation of the items.

We are not against 'synthetic biology.' We are against irresponsible synthetic biology. To test a new breed just for 90 days on piglets and claim that the Genetically Modified Organization is safe for human consumption is irresponsible.

Testing the GMO on rats used for medical research for their full life -- about 2 years -- and selecting only those GMO that are found to be safe over a lifetime is indeed responsible synthetic biology.

India conducts most of the research in government funded laboratories where the profit motive is absent. Thus in contrast to private organizations that mainly want to better their bottom line, India has the potential and the opportunity to develop responsible synthetic biology.

We hope that under the ambit of the 'Food Security Act' India indirectly improves the nutritional status of her poor.

Don't you agree?

Yes sir. I agree with you. Hope recently introduced food security bill will have positive impact in improving the nutritional status of 'at risk' population. There should be efforts to contain misuse/pilferage etc,. and the benefits reach the needy!

Hello, empirically, albeit with a small but representative sample size, studies have shown that increase agricultural production alone can not bring about a reduction in malnutrition unless and except there us an increase in income and ensuring that farmers can actually process and add value to their products before being released to the markets.

Rationally and based on interactions with small scale farmers, increased agricultural productivity might bring about a temporary reduction in malnutrition, but the moment these surpluses were utilized are wasted due to poor processing facilities , the sooner the farmer gets back to its initial malnutrition status.

Adewumi and Animashaun 2013). Household dietary diversity, agricultural productivity and agricultural income. Empirical evidence of linkages among small scale farming households in Nigeria.

Hello, empirically, albeit with a small but representative sample size, studies have shown that increase agricultural production alone can not bring about a reduction in malnutrition unless and except there us an increase in income and ensuring that farmers can actually process and add value to their products before being released to the markets.

Rationally and based on interactions with small scale farmers, increased agricultural productivity might bring about a temporary reduction in malnutrition, but the moment these surpluses were utilized are wasted due to poor processing facilities , the sooner the farmer gets back to its initial malnutrition status.

Adewumi and Animashaun 2013). Household dietary diversity, agricultural productivity and agricultural income. Empirical evidence of linkages among small scale farming households in Nigeria.

Dear Graziano,

I've really admired your work on the Jevon's Paradox and land-sparing. I agree with one of your earlier comments that the focus on production at least bears closer consideration given that increasing production has obvious environmental costs, while changing distribution/inequality, maternal & female education rates, water & sanitation, dietary diversity all have less clear and direct links to environmental costs (and indeed some, like female empowerment, *may* have environmental benefits; see the work of Bina Agarwal).

Your question is now a couple years old, so I'm not sure if you've come across the most recent work by Smith & Haddad, following up on their 2001 work: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305750X14003726 . The results are qualitatively the same as their 2001 piece.

As you reference, it is somewhat shocking that more work along these lines and the lines of Sen have not been conducted, but I think there is compelling circumstantial evidence that it is not more commonly conducted because (1) the connection between production and decreasing hunger is so taken-for-granted that it does not occur to most people to examine it, and (2) it really does challenge current vested interests in academia, government policy, and business, and so numerous indirect ways end up discouraging the asking of your question rigorously.

Other interesting and important work to note is recent pieces by Headey and others on food prices, and how higher food prices may decrease poverty in the "long run" (1-5 years): https://www.odi.org/sites/odi.org.uk/files/odi-assets/publications-opinion-files/8976.pdf ; http://www.foodreserves.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/ifpridp01331.pdf ; http://elibrary.worldbank.org/doi/abs/10.1596/1813-9450-7011 ; http://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev-resource-100815-095303

Stephen Devereux's work is also instructive, especially with regards to refining/thinking about Sen's theories and contributions (e.g. http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13600810120088859).

Jahi