Rome-. The number of hungry people in Asia and the Pacific has risen by more than 50 million since the arrival of COVID-19, according to a joint FAO/UNICEF report published here today.
The report of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), highlights that the food security and nutrition situation in the region has worsened and that more than 375 million people faced hunger in 2020, and more. 54 million from the previous year.
A statement by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the Asia-Pacific Regional Panorama of Food Security and Nutrition 2021 states that in that part of the world more than one billion people were denied adequate food in 2020, an increase of nearly 150 million. In just one year.
As the text comments, the high cost of a healthy diet and high levels of poverty and income inequality put healthy diets beyond the reach of 1.8 billion people.
Covid-19 has exacerbated the negative trend witnessed in the region in recent years, in the reduction of the number of undernourished people and the prevalence of some nutritional indicators, such as stunting in children under the age of five.
The report acknowledges that the situation could have been worse “had it not been for the response of governments and the impressive social protection measures they have implemented during the crisis”.
He also thinks that to rebuild better food environments, future agricultural food systems will need to provide better production, better nutrition, a better environment and a better life.
Both FAO and UNICEF agree that the approach should target the needs of small family farmers and indigenous peoples in the area.
They also suggest that diets should prioritize the nutritional needs of vulnerable groups, including children and young women.
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