This Monday, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), through its Deputy Director General, Mario Lubetkin, reported that due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the climate and economic crisis, and the war in Ukraine, the number of hungry people in Latin America increased by 30% since 2019.
According to statements it gave to the EFE news agency, the FAO estimates that there are more than 56 million people in a situation of hunger, 30% of the 2019 figure of 43 million. The rise in prices arises from the complete destruction of plantations, but it is also the tremendous affectation of small family farming producers, so it is a double effect,” Lubetkin told the EFE news agency.
Given this, the deputy director proposes that one should “prevent the foreseeable” and “mitigate the mitigable”, in order to prepare small producers and family farmers for a scenario that could be a terrible situation. So he warned that governments and international institutions have to prepare to help financially.
The organization’s representative in Latin America and the Caribbean stated that the non-governmental institution would be making a great effort in family farming in the region, since it represents 80% of the work base at the field level. One of the initiatives that the institution will now maintain as a goal is to bring family farming to school canteens so that, based on production in small distances, students in more precarious situations have the guarantee of having lunch.
In addition to that, he warned this Monday that the impact of the El Niño phenomenon, a colloquial name to refer to periods of drought, can be a determining factor in food prices during those months. This means that the costs could increase the figures for food insecurity in Central America, with El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua being the most affected.
The outlook posed by the agency is less encouraging for the central region of the continent, because seasonal forecasts suggest a high probability of below-average rainfall and higher temperatures in the period from June to August.
With information from EFE
Keep reading:
- FARC dissidence threatens regional elections in Colombia
- Old woman is beaten by her husband for putting too much salt in rice, video of the woman is broadcast on TikTok