Hunger And Poverty Essay

Not every poor person is hungry, but almost all hungry people are poor. Millions live with hunger and malnourishment because they simply can not afford to buy enough food, can not afford nutritious foods, or can not afford the farming supplies they need to grow enough good food of their own. Hunger can be viewed as a dimension of extreme poverty. It is often called the most severe and critical manifestation of poverty. The United Nation’s Millennium Development Goals conflate hunger and poverty in its first goal to “Eradicate Extreme Poverty and Hunger”.

Poverty levels have been closely associated with the nutritional status of the population. Besides, populations with higher incidence of poverty are also likely to have higher levels of underweight children (an indicator of hunger). In the Indian context, with poverty estimates given by the Planning Commission and weight for age data (as the indicator of nutrition) from the National Family Survey, it is observed that the states having higher incidence of poverty have higher prevalence of underweight children of aged three years. At the same time states that have exhibited relatively lower levels of poverty too have higher incidence of underweight children. This indicates that the reduction in poverty level does not necessarily guarantee reduction in the extent of hunger.

Using the data in tables 3.3 and 3.5, we examined that the proportion of underweight children is substantially higher for states with higher levels of poverty. At the same time, it is also high in many of the states where poverty levels are relatively lower. For example, the states of Orissa, Madhya Pradesh and Bihar have higher levels of both poverty and hunger, whereas in the states of Haryana, Pu...

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.... India has many nutrition and social safety net programs, some of which have had success in several states in addressing the needs of poor households. These programmes include:

• Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS)

• Mid-Day Meals Programme

• Public Distribution System (PDS)

• Community Public Works Programmes

• Annapurna Program.

• National food for work programme

Given the large amount of resources flowing into programmes for food and nutritional security, Planning Commission proposes to constitute a committee to monitor ‘Food and Nutrition Security. The Committee will consist of nutritionists, social scientists, development practitioners, bureaucrats and NGOs. It is expected to monitor the outcomes of specific interventions as also review overall food availability both at the national and state levels. It could also identify pockets of extreme hunger