Financial meltdown and malnutrition.

• Author: Von Braun, Joachim
• Position: Forecast 2020 - Report

In the aftermath of the recent global food crisis and economic downturn, the world's poor face unparalleled challenges to their food and nutrition security. While increased volatility in food prices will likely continue, wages for unskilled labour are failing to keep pace. Meanwhile, the financial crisis has pushed up unemployment and further reduced the purchasing power of poor people, who in a globalized economy now feel the effects of economic shocks more acutely. The crisis has also limited the funds available for social protection, which are essential for protecting the most vulnerable people from malnourishment. Under these circumstances health expenditures are often unaffordable. Because poor people in developing countries spend between 50 to 70 per cent of their income on food, they have little capacity to adapt, and their health is being sacrificed as a result.

RESTRICTED BUDGETS, LOWER FOOD CONSUMPTION, MICRONUTRIENT DEFICIENCIES

To cope with financial constraints, households reduce their food consumption and calorie intake. With reduced wages, households also cut spending on goods and services that are essential for their health and welfare, such as clean water, sanitation, education, and health care. In the context of economic pressures, nutritious food is now more expensive, which means developing country consumers shift to even less-balanced diets.

In Guatemala, for example, the price of a diet based on corn tortilla, vegetable oil, vegetables, and beans--which supplies key recommended micronutrients--was almost twice as high in 2008 as the price of a less-nutritious diet based on tortilla and vegetable oil alone. However, the cost of the balanced diet accounts for more than half the total income of a poor household living on one dollar a day per person. In Bangladesh, a 50 per cent increase in the price of food is estimated to raise the prevalence of iron deficiency among women and children by 25 per cent. Micronutrient deficiencies have negative consequences on nutrition and health, and include impaired cognitive development, lower resistance to disease, and increased risks during childbirth for both mothers and children. Micronutrient malnutrition can also impact economic productivity.

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