Even as the World Food Day was observed on October 16, developing countries are becoming increasingly dependent on imports to meet their most basic food requirements. According to the recent data compiled by the World Bank the nett cereal imports by developing countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America are projected to increase to 265 million tonnes in 2030 from 85 million tonnes in 2000.
Although the world’s granaries still have grains to meet the needs of deficit countries, this bounty cannot be presumed available for ever. Climate change is adversely affecting farming, not only of developing countries but also of big exporters like the USA, Australia and the European Union.
Secondly, a large chunk of the food-crop surplus of these countries, particularly the USA, is now being diverted to bio-fuels. Thus, some of these crop surpluses are likely to satiate the hunger of cars rather than the hunger of people.
Another aspect of food imports from some developed countries like the USA is that these may increasingly consist of genetically engineered crops or GMOs. There is enormous accumulating evidence of serious risks and hazards associated with GMOs. In May 2000 761 scientists from 79 countries signed an open letter to express their serious concern about the hazards GMOs pose to environment, food security, human and animal health.
In recent years there has been enormous concentration in world agribusiness. According to the data compiled by the World Bank, in 2004 the market share for the four largest agrochemical and seed companies (the concentration ratio of the four largest companies, the concentration ratio of top four, or CR4) reached 60 per cent for agri-chemicals and 33 per cent for seeds, (compared to 47 per cent and 23 per cent respectively in 1997). The CR4 in biotechnology patents was 38 per cent in 2004.
As even the World Bank says, when an industry’s CR4 exceeds 40 per cent it is widely believed that market competitiveness begins to decline, leading to higher spreads between what consumers pay and what producers receive for their produce. Coffee has 500 million consumers, and involves 25 million farmers or farm workers, but international traders have a CR4 of 40 per cent and coffee roasters have a CR4 of 45 per cent. The share of the retail price retained by coffee producing countries declined from about 33 per cent in the early 1990s to 10 per cent in 2002. In the tea value chain just three companies control more than 80 per cent of the world market.
Under such circumstances, the going can be tough for farmers of developing countries as they are fast integrated to an increasingly globalised economy. A briefing paper titled “Kicking down the door” prepared by Oxfam outlines some of the threats. “The USA and EU, in particular, have repackaged their agricultural subsidies so that they appear to be legitimate under WTO rules, allowing them to continue dumping products such as rice, corn, milk, sugar, and cotton at prices far below their true costs of production. At the same time, they are aggressively pushing developing countries to open their markets further by cutting their import tariffs. If this rich-country agenda succeeds, the result will be a bonanza for corporate agri-business, but it will threaten the livelihoods of poor country producers, who make up 96 per cent of the world’s farmers.”
Clearly, then, very serious threats to food security are emerging in developing countries and a lot of caution is needed. One way out is to encourage all districts and even panchayats to give first priority in farming to local staple foods. Secondly diverse traditional varieties of staple food varieties should be protected not only in gene banks but also on farmers’ fields. Last but not the least, technologies best suited to low-resource base of small farmers, making the most scientific, cost-effective use of local resources should be encouraged.
