What Causes Food Insecurity

Mankind is standing on the threshold of the new scientific era, accompanying many unprecedented challenges. Food is one of the crucial aspects. Food security is a term including the availability, individual’s access, utilization as well as the stability of food supply. (FAO 2009) It represents the hope for no shortage of food. However, notwithstanding the global development, many people around the world are still suffering from starvation. This essay will discuss two major causes of food insecurity, focusing on the economic reason and climate change, because they are the potential explanations that can have an effect on everywhere on Earth.

A poor or unstable economy can lead to food insecurity, both in the developed and developing countries.

Climate changes involve global warming, variation in water, more frequent extreme weather conditions and change in patterns. (Mburia 2016) This can be reflected on both the farmers and crops. The phrase ‘organic food’ has inevitably increased its popularity among the society and stands for healthiness and zero-pollution. Nevertheless, due to the changes in climate, the chances of pests and diseases among plants drastically augment. They are impossible for farmers to deal with organically. (Mburia 2016) The results of climate change upon food security can be found in figure 1. (Wheeler n.d., p. 5) It is based on data from 1990-2010 and shows how climate change affects different sections of food security. The main point to notice from the diagram is that climate variability influences mostly on the food availability, reflected in the amount of crop production. Figure 2 displays the potential change in cereal yields due to global warming. (Wheeler n.d., p. 7) The majority of the world is colored yellow and red on the upper map. This indicates that most of the world would face a decrease in cereal production to different extends estimated in 2004. The statistics collected by Campbell et al. (2016) proved that an approximately 6% reduction of wheat yields will happen for every degree rise in temperature. Furthermore, according to Mburia (2016), the Arabica coffee is becoming less attributing to the rising temperature and unpredictable rainfall. Consistent with the trend in the deterioration of climate change, it is safe to deduce that the living environment for crops and plants will remain