In 1971, the population of Bangladesh was 75 million people whereas the present population is over 160 million. But food production in the country has gone on matching the need of this more than doubled population. Large scale and persistent hunger like in the pre independence era is hardly noted in Bangladesh today.

According to latest reports, Bangladesh has moved 13 notches up to the 75th position among 107 countries in the Global Hunger Index (GHI) 2020, surpassing its much bigger neighbours India and Pakistan .This year, the country achieved a GHI score of 20.4 out of 100. A higher score implies a worsening hunger situation, whereas zero is the best score – indicating no hunger.

Bangladesh managed to lower its GHI score of 34.1 achieved in 2000, showing an improvement by over 40% in these 20 years. Thus, it shows gradual but steady improvement in the overall hunger and under-nutrition indicators since the beginning of this millennium. Specially, the hunger reduction has accelerated in the last ten years under the present government led by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

Conspicuously in the last edition of the global ranking published in 2019, Bangladesh ranked 88th out of 117 countries, with a score of 25.8. The latest index was published jointly on October 12 by international humanitarian organisation Concern Worldwide and Germany’s Welthungerhilfe – one of the largest private aid organisations in the world.

Commenting on the matter, Centre for Policy Dialogue’s Executive Director Dr Fahmida Khatun put more emphasis on food availability, saying, “If we look at the official statistics of food production in Bangladesh, it will show an increasing trend, but the problem is with food availability.”The availability of food must be increased along with the food production, and we need to ensure sufficient access to food for the marginalised people.”

Dr Fahmida also mentioned the importance of a proper distribution channel along with an uninterrupted and smooth supply chain to ensure food accessibility.”We have done well in reducing hunger in the country, but we should not become complacent. Instead, we should work more on how we can introduce more measures to increase food availability among the people,” she said, adding that modern technology should be utilised for higher food production.

Summarising her opinion, Dr Fahmida said, “We should focus broadly on three points to reduce hunger, firstly by increasing agricultural productivity through technology; secondly by ensuring an uninterrupted food distribution channel and supply chain, and lastly through boosting the purchasing power by generating more employment.”

The Global Hunger Index measures and tracks the hunger level globally, regionally and nationally in order to trigger actions for reducing hunger across the globe. The score of countries is based on four components – Undernourishment, Child Wasting, Child Stunting and Child Mortality.
According to the index, Bangladesh has shown the biggest improvement in curbing Child Stunting. During the nine-year period from 2012 to 2020, the country reduced child stunting by 12.8 percentage points.

Moreover, Bangladesh also sawimprovement in the undernourishment component. Around 13% of the total population are experiencing undernourishment or insufficient caloric intake. The value was 13.8% in 2012, suggesting an improvement of 0.8 percentage points during the period.
Contacted, Sarwar Mahmud, the Directorate General (DG) of Food, said the country is unlikely to face any food crisis even if the coronavirus situation prevails for a long timed due to adequate stock of food grains, including rice, wheat, potato and other essential commodities. “We’re not worried about food security since Bangladesh is not a food-deficit country. We got a bountifulBoroproduction while we’re expecting an impressive production of Aus and Aman paddy as well,” he added.

The DG said they have around 11lakh metric tonnes of rice and 3 lakh metric tonnes of wheat while rice traders, millers, wholesalers and farmers have more food grains stock than the government has. “Many people also hoarded food out of their fear of food crisis. So, our food grains stock is adequate to meet the country’s demand for more than a year.”

Agriculture Secretary Md Nasiruzzaman said coronavirus has no impact on Bangladesh’s agriculture sector and they do not think the country’s food security will be at stake if the corona situation prolongs.”We’ve got a bumper production of Bororice crop. We’ll also have a good production of Aus and Aman rice. We produced almost all crops and vegetables this season much more than what we did last year. So, we won’t face any food crisis under any situation,” he said.