Asia's Food Future: Disconnect between dietary changes and crop diversity
Full details
| Authors & editors | |
| Publisher | Milling & Grain |
| Year of publication | 2017 April |
| Languages | |
| Medium | Digital |
| Edition | 1 |
| Topics | |
| Tags | |
| Scope & content | By Raghavan ('Ragha') Sampathkumar As discussed previously, countries in Asia are facing the issue of double burden - malnutrition and obesity - at varying levels simultaneously. Matured economies such as Malaysia and Korea are seeing increasing levels of child obesity while India, Indonesia, China and Philippines are still facing huge issues of undernourishment. Nearly a third of all children in South East Asia remain malnourished and the majority of them are in these fast-growing middleincome countries. There is another category at the bottom that requires more serious attention with countries such as Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos PDR. While Asia's economic growth is shifting the diets towards more protein (particularly from animal sources) and high value (e.g. horticultural crops), the region remains dependent on trade to meet its demand for feed raw materials. Although steps are taken in these countries by the policy makers to boost domestic production (e.g. corn in Indonesia), many times the efforts have unintended consequences and result in shortages and increased domestic prices. On one hand, this could be good for the farmers, but consumers bear the brunt as food prices inch up. However, similar to the geo-political moves that were discussed in the last column, policies often seem to be made in silos and mostly focused on achieving self-sufficiency through increased domestic production rather than having a holistic view of balancing it with international trade…Read more. |
Pictures
