The annual Global Report on Food Crises, released earlier this month, says 193 million across the globe experienced acute food insecurity last year.
According to The Global Network Against Food Crises, which has compiled information since 2016, this represented a 25-percent increase from 2020. The group includes the European Union and the United Nations World Food Programme.
The main drivers of this tragedy were conflicts, weather extremes and macroeconomic shocks, mostly caused by the pandemic.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine earlier this year is also seen to worsen the 2022 numbers, when the 2021 estimate is already a record high.
Here at home, we are being warned of a looming food crisis, and the incoming administration is hard pressed to show it fully grasps the graveness of the problems and is committed to addressing it for all Filipinos.
In an early interview, President-elect Ferdinand Marcos Jr. said he plans to take on the problem by increasing production and continuing importation.
The choice of an Agriculture Secretary would be crucial at this point.
Initial appointments to the economic team have been encouraging, with investors, businessmen and analysts cheering the competence of the chosen alter egos of the incoming chief executive. The public is confident that these men’s expertise will do much to enable our economy to recover from the serious blow dealt by the pandemic.
We need no less than a similar confidence in whoever the agriculture secretary would turn out to be. The position will be a difficult one to fill – if one were serious about putting the right, the best, individual at the helm of a troubled sector. Aside from competence in theory, that person needs to have the depth and breadth of understanding of the different agriculture stakeholders’ concerns.
We should brace ourselves for another kind of crisis, while we do what we can to get by during difficult times, we should at all times hold our leaders accountable for the decisions they make on our behalf.
