FAO sees decline in 'undernutrition', but the number of hungry continues to grow.

• Position: Food and Agriculture Organization

FAO sees decline in "undernutrition', but the number of hungry continues to grow

For the first time in 40 years a decline in the incidence of undernutrition in the developing world has been detected by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). Rapid population growth, however, has pushed the number of hungry people slightly upwards, according to FAO's Fifth World Food Survey, published in December.

"There is evidence of a turn in the tide', FAO Director-General Edouard Saouma states in the foreword to the Survey. But he cautions that there are no grounds for complacency. "As we have seen from the current African food crisis, widespread malnutrition can all too quickly turn into actual famine and starvation'.

The Survey provides both high and low estimates of the undernourished, which reflect two interpretations of the body's energy requirements. According to lower estimates, at least 335 million people in the developing market economies were undernourished in 1979-1981, some 10 million more than a decade before. However, the proportion of people suffering from hunger dropped from 19 to 15 per cent of the total population.

Higher estimates indicate that at least 494 million people were undernourished in these same countries at the end of the 1970s--an increase of 22 million over the decade. In the meantime, the incidence of hunger dropped from 28 to 23 per cent of the population.

"The fact that the increases in numbers of undernourished were so small implies that it was possible to provide fairly adequate nutrition for the vast majority of the 470 million increase in the population of the developing market economy countries during the 1970s', the Survey notes. The grouping of developing market economies excludes countries with centrally-planned economies in Asia, such as China.

Area highs, lows: Despite global gains, the Survey records a widening gap in per capita food consumption between the richest and poorest countries. There is a "malnutrition of abundance' in developed countries, where food consumption now averages 3,390 calories per person a day and where obesity appears to be increasing.

At the other end of the scale, in 26 developing countries with 238 million people, daily per capita food consumption plummeted over the decade, in some cases to below 1,800 calories per day. The least developed countries comprise the only economic group to experience an increase in the percentage of their population afflicted by malnutrition.

Regionally, Africa is falling behind the rest of the developing world in increasing food supplies. In the 1970s Africa had the slowest rate of growth in per capita dietary energy supplies (0.4 per cent a year), and the largest increase in the number of undernourished people. Under the higher estimate, there were 99 million undernourished people in Africa in 1979-1981, compared to 81 million the decade before.

While Africa swung into a negative growth rate in per capita food supplies, the Far East showed an improvement. Asian centrally planned economies nearly doubled an already high annual rate of increase. Latin America, which saw slight increases in the 1970s, now records stagnant growth. The Near East's impressive gains in per capita food supplies are slackening somewhat in the 1980s but are still growing at more than 1 per cent a year.

Changes in food consumption patterns are also recorded in the Survey. In developed market economies people consumed fewer cereals and potatoes and more fats and oils, meat and alcoholic beverages. Rapid urbanization in developing countries, particularly in Africa and Latin America, has caused a shift away from roots, tubers and traditional cereals to wheat and rice.

Malnourished children: The Survey notes that young children are the first to suffer from the effects of malnutrition and that they constitute a disproportionately large number of the malnourished population in developing countries. Rural children appear to be more at risk than those living in cities.

Profiles of malnourished families are included in the Survey for the first time. One cites a poor farm family of six in Africa which...