Food Insecurity in Ethiopia

Abstract

Food insecurity is directly related to poverty at the global, regional, national, and local levels. It is a result of lack of income and access to food, which is driven by poverty. Ethiopia, located at Northeastern of Africa is second populated country with a population of about 92.3 million and has a physical size of 1.115 million hectares. Ethiopia is one of the poorest countries in the world, and its poverty, natural resource degradation and food insecurity seem to be part and parcel of the same vicious circle. Majority of the population in country are food insecure. Ethiopia encountered serious famine at different times from 1970s to up to date. About 25 million were directly affected by famine in 1958 and 1977.  However, since early 1980s number of populations, especially women and children were affected by famine does not exceed the 10 million. Surprising in 2015/16 in Ethiopia, more than 10 million populations are/being affected by famine. This is caused by the combination of deforestation in the country and world climate change “El-Nino”.  Currently, greater proportion the population of Ethiopia consumes food of less than 2,100Kcal/day. At different areas food insecure groups employ different survival strategies/mechanisms to handle food insecurity by mobilizing all available resources to resist the food insecurity problem in Ethiopia. This mechanism extends up to involving in criminal activities. Generally food insecurity in the world and specifically in Ethiopia can be addressed through a more equitable distribution and access to food.

Keywords: Famine, Poverty, Food Insecurity, Natural Resource Degradation