True cost of a plate of food around world
GENEVA: How much would you expect to pay for the most basic plate of food? The kind of thing you might whip up at home – nothing fancy, just enough to fill you up and meet a third of today’s calorie needs. A soup, maybe, or a simple stew – some beans or lentils, a handful of rice, bread, or corn?
In the rich Global North – say, in New York State – such a meal would cost almost nothing to make: 0.6 per cent of the average daily income, or US$ 1.20 (about RM5).
In parts of the developing world, by contrast, food affordability can shrink to the point of absurdity: in South Sudan, a country born out of war and disintegrating into more war, the meal-to-income ratio is 300 times that of industrialised countries.
It is, in other words, as if a New Yorker had to pay nearly US$ 348.36 ( RM1,462) for the privilege of cooking and eating that plate of food.
How do people in South Sudan afford it? It’s simple. They don’t.
This is not a unique issue to South Sudan. Across the board, food is becoming ever less affordable in poorer countries that are subject to political instabilities. Lack of access to food, and the costliness of it, have many causes: climate extremes, natural disasters, post-harvest losses, or bad governance, all of which can damage- or even shatter- farming supply chains and markets.
But, one overriding cause stands out: conflict.
The 2018 edition of WFPs Counting the Beans: The True Cost of a Plate of Food Around the World index, now spanning 52 countries, underscores this clear correlation between food affordability costs and political stability and security.
The index looks at whether food costs for the original 33 countries analysed in 2017 have risen or fallen, and compares costs for the same meal in some of the world’s poorest places with one of its richest, by using a New York baseline to highlight vast gaps in global food affordability.
In many countries, it was found that food affordability measured in this way has actually improved since 2017. This is situational, thanks to strong economic growth, political stability, and/or a better rainy season- or in the case of southern Africa- humanitarian assistance helping to offset the effects of severe drought.
Though despite such progress made in many countries through the past year, food costs are often still intensely disproportionate in relation to income. This is the case across much of Africa, as well as in parts of Asia and, to a lesser degree, of Latin America.
Among the countries surveyed for the study, Peru tops the list with the most affordable plate at the New York equivalent of US$ 3.44 (about RM14.50), just 1.6 per cent of per capita income, vs. what that same plate would cost in New York, amounting to 0.6 per cent of per capita income.
While Laos and Jordan are close runners-up to Peru, other countries have deteriorated. Almost invariably, these are nations where peace has been (further) eroded by violence, insecurity or political tension, including South Sudan- where the cost of a plate of food has soared from the exorbitant 155 per cent of daily income in 2016 ( US$ 321.70) to 201.7 per cent of daily income in 2018 (US$ 348.36).
It now costs twice the national daily income to buy a plate of food in South Sudan. Northeast Nigeria took second to last place, at US$ 222.05, or 128.6 per cent of daily income in 2018, up from US$ 200.32, or 121 per cent of daily income in 2016.
These abysmal numbers highlight the vast gaps in global food affordability, where 821 million people go hungry while elsewhere one can get a simple nutritious meal with a just a handful of change.
The fact that this still occurs defies both reason and decency, and it’s why we – the World Food Programme and other humanitarian partners – are there. — IPS