Editorial of the Day: Measuring Hunger Across States (The Hindu)

Context: The article is discussing the issue of food insecurity, hunger, and child malnutrition in India despite the country’s significant food production and food security programs. It highlights the low ranking of India in the Global Hunger Index 2022. The article also highlights the status of undernourishment in our country and emphasizes that there are significant disparities in food security among different states and UTs within India. Therefore, it calls for the rolling out of the State Specific Hunger Index that would help assess the extent of undernourishment and hunger at a regional level that would in turn help and enhance the policymaking process related to food security.

Background

What is the Global Hunger Index?

• The Global Hunger Index (GHI) is a tool for comprehensively measuring and tracking hunger at global, regional, and national levels.
• GHI scores are based on the values of four component indicators:
  • Undernourishment
  • Child stunting
  • Child wasting
  • Child mortality
• The GHI score is calculated on a 100-point scale reflecting the severity of hunger – zero is the best score (implies no hunger) and 100 is the worst.
• The GHI is prepared by European NGOs of Concern Worldwide and Welthungerhilfe.
• The GHI is an annual report and each set of GHI scores uses data from a 5-year period. The 2022 GHI scores are calculated using data from 2017 through 2021.
• India and Neighboring Countries: Among the South Asian countries, India (107) is ranked below Sri Lanka (64), Nepal (81), Bangladesh (84), and Pakistan (99).
  • India has a score of 29.1 which places it under ‘serious’ category.
  • Afghanistan (109) is the only country in South Asia that performs worse than India on the index.
  • China, with a score of less than 5, has topped the chart, topped the chart, together with 16 other countries.
• India’s Performance in the Four Indicators:
  • Child Wasting: India’s child wasting rate (low weight for height), at 19.3%, is worse than the levels recorded in 2014 (15.1%) and even 2000 (17.15%).
    • It is the highest for any country in the world and drives up the region’s average owing to India’s large population.
  • Undernourishment: Prevalence of undernourishment has also risen in the country from 14.6% in 2018-2020 to 16.3% in 2019-2021.
    • It implies that 224.3 million people in India (out of 828 million globally) are considered undernourished.
    • The indicator measures the proportion of the population facing chronic deficiency of dietary energy intake.
  • Child Stunting and Mortality: India has shown improvement in child stunting and child mortality.
    • Child stunting (low height for age) has declined from 38.7% to 35.5% between 2014 and 2022.
    • Child mortality (mortality rate under the age of five) has dropped from 4.6% to 3.3% in the same comparative period.

Decoding the Editorial

• The article mentions that India ranks relatively low on the Global Hunger Index (GHI) for 2022, coming in at 107 out of 121 countries.
  • The GHI is a measure that assesses undernourishment and hunger at the national level, considering factors like calorie undernourishment, child malnutrition, and under-five mortality.
• It also states that India has a large number of undernourished people, with 224.3 million individuals facing undernourishment.
• It emphasises the importance of leveraging subnational data to create a more localized hunger index specifically for India.
  • Such an index would help assess the extent of undernourishment and hunger at a regional level, which is crucial for addressing the Sustainable Development Goals related to eradicating hunger and malnutrition.
  • This localized approach can help policymakers and organizations better target and address food insecurity issues in specific regions within India.

The State Hunger Index:

The discussion in the article centers around the State Hunger Index (SHI), which is a tool used to assess and measure hunger and undernutrition at a subnational level within India. The SHI is calculated using a set of indicators similar to the Global Hunger Index (GHI), with some variations due to data availability.

• Indicators Used: The SHI is computed using four key indicators: stunting, wasting, and mortality among children below the age of five, and body mass index (BMI) undernourishment among the working-age population. Notably, calorie undernourishment data have not been available since 2012, so BMI undernourishment is used as a substitute.
• Data Sources: Data for the SHI indicators are sourced from surveys and studies, such as the fifth round of the National Family Health Survey (NFHS-5) and the Longitudinal Ageing Study in India (LASI). These sources provide essential information about child malnutrition and adult undernourishment.
• SHI Scoring: The SHI scores range from 0 to 100, with higher scores indicating more hunger. Specific score ranges are used to categorise hunger levels: below 10 is considered low hunger, 10-20 is moderate, 20-30 is serious, 30-40 is alarming, and 50 or above is extremely alarming.
• State-Level Findings: The SHI scores for various states in India are: States such as Bihar, Jharkhand, and Chhattisgarh scored 35, falling into the ‘alarming’ category, while some other states like Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, Assam, and Odisha scored above the national average, reflecting a serious hunger issue.
• Comparison Over Time: The article also mentions a previous effort in 2008 to assess hunger at a subnational level, which found different states leading in terms of performance. This indicates that the hunger situation can change over time.
• Worsening GHI Score: The Global Hunger Index for India has deteriorated over the last five years primarily due to increasing calorie undernourishment. The proportion of calorie undernourishment has been on the rise since 2017, reaching 16.3% in 2020. This trend is a significant concern.
• Government Response: The Indian government has disputed the GHI findings, raising concerns about data and methodology but without providing empirical evidence to support its claims. Additionally, it mentions the absence of recent National Sample Survey (NSS) rounds on nutritional intake, which used to provide valuable insights into calorie undernourishment.

The Reality:

• While the GHI has faced significant criticism from experts regarding its conceptualisation, indicator selection, and aggregation methods, it does provide critical insight into the state of undernourishment and child nutrition.
• India’s poor performance in the GHI is primarily attributed to its high prevalence of undernourishment and child malnutrition.
• India ranks unfavourably in child wasting, performing worse than many low-income African nations.
• The NFHS-5 indicated that one-third of children under the age of five are stunted and underweight, while every fifth child suffers from wasting.
• Despite India’s notable progress in alleviating extreme poverty over the last 15 years, as indicated by the recent National Multidimensional Poverty Index, challenges persist in addressing the disparity in food insecurity, hunger, and child malnutrition.

Beyond the Editorial

Initiatives to Eradicate Hunger/Malnutrition:

• Eat Right India Movement: An outreach activity organised by the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) for citizens to nudge them towards eating right.
• POSHAN Abhiyan: Launched by the Ministry of Women and Child Development in 2018, it targets to reduce stunting, undernutrition, anaemia (among young children, women and adolescent girls).
• Pradhan Mantri Matru Vandana Yojana: A centrally sponsored scheme executed by the Ministry of Women and Child Development, is a maternity benefit programme being implemented in all districts of the country with effect from 1st January, 2017.
• Food Fortification: Food Fortification or Food Enrichment is the addition of key vitamins and minerals such as iron, iodine, zinc, Vitamin A & D to staple foods such as rice, milk and salt to improve their nutritional content.
• National Food Security Act, 2013: It legally entitled up to 75% of the rural population and 50% of the urban population to receive subsidised food grains under the Targeted Public Distribution System.
• Mission Indradhanush: It targets children under 2 years of age and pregnant women for immunisation against 12 Vaccine-Preventable Diseases (VPD).
• Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) Scheme: It offers a package of six services (Supplementary Nutrition, Pre-school non-formal education, Nutrition & health education, Immunisation, Health check-up and Referral services) to children in the age group of 0-6 years, pregnant women and lactating mothers.

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