The Economist - Feeding the Hungry

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May 6th 2004

In the fourth of a series of articles on the Copenhagen Consensus project*, we look at hunger and malnutrition

TELEVISED images of starving children with distended bellies have brought the problem of global hunger home to people in rich countries. Sadly, however, the problem is far deeper than an immediate lack of food, as a new paper for the Copenhagen Consensus project points out. Jere Behrman of the University of Pennsylvania, Harold Alderman of the World Bank and John Hoddinott of the International Food Policy Research Institute have examined the extent of hunger and malnutrition and four concrete proposals to ameliorate it.

Around a billion people, say the authors, are malnourished, and around a sixth of these are children. That is not only a deplorable human tragedy in its own right. It also leads to measurable economic losses—ie, further poverty. Lives are shortened, causing lost output and income. Those who survive the effects of malnutrition may be less productive, perhaps throughout their lives. Hunger also often leaves people more susceptible to disease, so that more output has to be devoted to health care.

The benefits of reducing hunger and malnutrition are many. Better-fed people are likely to contribute longer to GDP. They are even likely to have healthier babies. Infant mortality is much higher for babies with low birth-weights. According to one study, an additional pound at birth reduces mortality by 14%.

Labour productivity can be strongly influenced by malnutrition at an early age, since it can affect people's size and strength. Stunted growth—one symptom of malnutrition—often leads to lower earnings. One study in Brazil found that a 1% increase in height is associated with a 2-2.4% rise in wages.

Improved nutrition can allow children to perform better in school. Moreover, malnourished children may receive less education because they are not seen as good “investments”. Eliminating hunger, therefore, can increase the prevalence of skills needed for higher value-added jobs.

Hunger, the authors note, is not caused only by a lack of food. Other factors can play big roles. Women's education and status are associated with the quality of their children's nutrition. Diseases such as AIDS and malaria can cause or worsen hunger, in part by shortening lives of breadwinners and by causing families to fail to pass down farming skills to future generations. Poor transport infrastructure can make it difficult for food to reach the people who need it most. And then there are trade barriers—put up by rich and poor countries alike—that keep farmers mired in poverty by depriving them of export markets.

But what can be done to address hunger directly? The authors note that measuring the benefits of reducing hunger is especially hard, thanks partly to the unintended consequences of some policies. Moreover, since the costs and benefits are incurred over lifetimes, discount rates play a big role, so the authors use a range of scenarios. Overall, they caution that there is no single “magic bullet” for hunger.

Aid or agriculture?

The first course they examine is halting the ill effects of hunger at the earliest possible stage: in utero. Each year, around 12m infants are born weighing less than 2.5 kilograms (5.5lb), a definition of low birth-weight. This includes roughly 22% of newborns in India and 30% in Bangladesh. The benefits of raising birth-weights come from several factors: reduced infant mortality, savings on health costs and lost output due to illness, improved growth and lifetime productivity. The costs of achieving these benefits take the form of providing medicines (anti-microbial and anti-parasitic treatments), keeping better track of mothers' health, and providing food and mineral supplements. Using a 5% discount rate, the benefits amount to some $580 for every infant who avoids a low birth-weight. Benefits exceed costs, sometimes by a wide margin, for all but one of the treatments considered.

Next, the authors investigate improving nutrition in young children. This is typically achieved by encouraging breast-feeding, and by educating mothers about “weaning foods”. The authors rely on successful policies from Latin America to draw their conclusions. The benefits, they find, are similar to those achieved from raising birth-weights, but the costs are more difficult to pinpoint. Even so, the authors think it likely that the benefits outweigh the costs.

Third is a reduction of deficiencies in key “micronutrients”, such as iodine, zinc, vitamin A and iron. The authors reckon that the benefits of increasing the uptake of these minerals, achieved through food-aid or supplements, “comfortably exceed” the costs. But they caution that the scope for taking advantage of this opportunity may be limited.

The fourth course is to improve agricultural technology—for example, by using higher-yielding crops (which are often genetically modified) and controlling pests better. Many studies show high rates of return from such improvements, and the authors argue that these returns dwarf those from the other policies they consider. One study in particular looks at the dissemination in the Philippines of Golden Rice, a genetically modified strain rich in vitamins and minerals. By some measures, that produced a benefit-to-cost ratio of between 14.3 and 79.3.

The authors see investments in technology as the most effective means of increasing the incomes of hungry people. Teaching a man to farm better, it seems, can yield far more than simply giving food or medicines away.