Since 2015, one of the primary goals of the global community to support sustainable development is to eradicate food insecurity before 2030. Is this possible? We tell you which the keys are, according to experts.

Improving the lives of vulnerable people whose lifestyle has been disturbed by conflicts, extreme climatic phenomena, and other disasters is necessary in order to avoid involuntary immigration, to end with the violence, and to guarantee fundamental rights.

Due to the pandemic, controlling global restriction circulation and trade embargo have fuelled the fear and suddenly it exploded. The chain of food supplies has been affected, exportations and importations have been disturbed, and demand and prices have been increased. It had been inevitable.

As several migrate farmers were confined, they were not able to cultivate and the food production was not picked.

Essential vegetables, as crop and rice, have risen about 8% and 25%, respectably. For instance, in Nigeria, the rice price has risen by 30% by the end of March.

Those people who have been affected have to ask for food, they are suffering from undernourishment or even they do not eat. In the poorest countries, the consequences are catastrophic: about two thousand million people run a high risk of extreme poverty.

To Máximo Torero, ONU Food and Agricultural Chief Economist in Rome, removing commercial barriers to export as well as import “would be a solution”.

Abolishing taxes and reducing importation prices would activate global deliveries, always taking necessary precautions to the workers and good transportation security.

The economist believes in the regional market among adjoining countries.  Especially, if governments are able to work together to give quick answers about bringing food to those places where it is more needed.

Keeping a balance between the food flow and the protection of public health is important, reducing the uncertainty by getting clear information about the available goods and avoiding citizens who choose die over facing the consequences of the economic depression that would emerge because of containing the virus.

To Abhijit Banerjee, Professor at Massachusetts Technology Institute and Nobel Prize in 2019, the key would not be left or reduce help programs, which are, up to now, motivating the career path of thousands of families; on the contrary, without them, people would be poorer and they would never be in a better economic situation.

With all the countries involved, the help to the developing communities is limited; nevertheless, to avoid the big proportions of destruction, countries should consume more.

Economies recover themselves from previous crises because the government intercedes in with recovery programs, as Marshall Plan.

On the contrary, as Natalia Linos comments, Chief Manager in the Health and Human Rights François-Xavier Bagnoud Center at Harvard University, a thorny issue would be arising: undernourishment provokes diseases which drive to poverty and food insecurity.

With the covid19, people who have fewer resources are exposed even more to the virus because they are not able to stock up on food; they frequently have to go out to look for food and those who work are not able to do it from home.

The WHO recommends guaranteeing the basic sanitary service to take care of those who suffer from malnutrition and the usage of mechanisms of detecting in the houses with food insecurity.

If the epidemiological proof forces us to impose restrictions, measures would be taken in order to avoid hungering.

Nowadays, according to Dr. Shailaja Fennell, Professor at Cambridge University, another example that is working out is the creation of a new model of distribution in which farmers take their own products to the local homes.

Agriculture is the main food source to 86% of the rural population in the world and it is the key to international development as well. The solution to having an efficient food insecurity management consists in the ability of communities to start with innovative local agricultural practices as well as emphasizing the relevance of the creativity in the meal preparation, changing recipes to use season ingredients and what we have available, in the rich countries as well as in the developing countries.

Last year, in Mozambique cyclones destroyed farms; consequently, the prices of the goods have risen, making even worse the food crisis; more than 67,000 below-5-years-old-children have suffered from severe malnutrition and 42.6% of them have physical development issues.

Several vulnerable homes were forced to reduce the frequency and numbers of meals; they used the cheapest wild less wanted favorable products. Is it possible that we are able to prevent and relieve these negative impacts?

Dealing with a sanitary emergency and food insecurity is not easy, that is clear. Yet, with cooperation, good hearts, and firm intentions of people like you, we can make it.

Let’s work for a secure future and be part of the change!

Translated by Julieta