Pretoria - South Africa is headed towards a hunger tipping point as the drought continues to threaten the country.
The drought and the resultant impact on the availability of food would exacerbate the country’s dire situation, which has one in nine people living with chronic hunger, and at least half the population unable to afford a decent meal.
Statistics, from food and hunger stakeholders indicated that as many as 14% of South African households could not afford to buy the food they need to sustain themselves.
“Because the size of families in the poor sections of the country outweighs any income gained, many individuals suffer both hunger and malnutrition,” the SA Food Bank said. “Poor people spend most of their money on food and they are more vulnerable to food and fuel price increases.”
They were often left with little to spend on other basic needs like education and mounting household debt, according to the Food Bank. “This creates and perpetuates an affordability crisis, the consequences of which will be dire for generations to come.”
Food prices would increase dramatically as the drought continued, noted a related report from ReliefWeb. “The poor and vulnerable have no means of escape. Those who live in poverty situations with no means of relief will suffer deeply.”
The Food Bank said urban and rural poor would be forced to compromise their nutrition by eating smaller varieties of food with less dietary diversity.
“They will eat less nutritious food, have malnutrition and skip meals, leaving them under-nourished.”
The Food Bank called on the government to step up interventions to address food insecurity, saying programmes were inadequate. One solution could be to partner with organisations which had hunger-fighting programmes.
“They could create and implement a comprehensive plan to seriously address food insecurity, and the government’s failure to act now and appropriately will certainly lead to further and more violent protests, or worse.”
There were programmes in place to fight malnutrition, among them the addition of key vitamins and minerals to wheat flour, maize flour and retail sugar in accordance with mandatory government regulations.
“But more needs to be done to save, like put a balanced plate of food in front of the up to 64% of children who die of malnutrition every year,” the World Food Programme said, adding that the fight against hunger could be won if all involved worked together.
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Pretoria News