[Senate Prints 111-10]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]


111th Congress 
 1st Session                COMMITTEE PRINT                     S. Prt.
                                                                 111-10
_______________________________________________________________________

                                     

 
                        GLOBAL FOOD INSECURITY:
                      PERSPECTIVES FROM THE FIELD

                               __________

                         REPORT TO THE MEMBERS

                                 OF THE

                     COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS

                          UNITED STATES SENATE

                     One Hundred Eleventh Congress

                             First Session

                            February 6, 2009

[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] TONGRESS.#13


       Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Relations

                       Available on the Internet:
              http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/index.html

                     U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
47-215 PDF                 WASHINGTON DC:  2009
---------------------------------------------------------------------
For Sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office
Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov  Phone: toll free (866) 512-1800; (202) 512ï¿½091800  
Fax: (202) 512ï¿½092104 Mail: Stop IDCC, Washington, DC 20402ï¿½090001

                     COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS

                 JOHN F. KERRY, Massachusetts, Chairman
CHRISTOPHER J. DODD, Connecticut     RICHARD G. LUGAR, Indiana
RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, Wisconsin         Republican Leader designee
BARBARA BOXER, California            BOB CORKER, Tennessee
ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey          JOHNNY ISAKSON, Georgia
BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland         JAMES E. RISCH, Idaho
ROBERT P. CASEY, Jr., Pennsylvania   JIM DeMINT, South Carolina
JIM WEBB, Virginia                   JOHN BARRASSO, Wyoming
JEANNE SHAHEEN, New Hampshire        ROGER F. WICKER, Mississippi
EDWARD E. KAUFMAN, Delaware
KIRSTEN E. GILLIBRAND, New York
                      David McKean, Staff Director
            Kenneth A. Myers, Jr., Republican Staff Director


                            C O N T E N T S

                              ----------                              
                                                                   Page
Letter of Transmittal............................................     V
Introduction.....................................................     1
Purpose and Methodology..........................................     2
Findings.........................................................     3
Recommendations..................................................     5
The Nature of Hunger.............................................     7
Why the Need for Action..........................................     9
Issues Affecting Food Security...................................    11
    Agriculture and Rural Development Investments................    15
    Infrastructure Investments...................................    17
    Education, Technology, Science, and Extension Investments....    18
    Sound Land Tenure Systems....................................    22
    Respect for Market Forces....................................    22
Justification of Approaches......................................    23
    Focus on Small Holders.......................................    23
    Embrace Technological Solutions..............................    24
    Empower Individuals Rather Than Enable Poverty...............    24
    Raise Incomes................................................    26
    Support Markets, Reduce Price Volatility, & Increase Market 
      Information................................................    26
    Integrate Nutrition Into Food Security Programs..............    27
    Achieve Better Donor Coordination in the Field...............    28
    Utilize Conservation Farming Techniques......................    28
    Integrate Approaches To Help Women in the Design of 
      Development Projects.......................................    29
    Don't Allow Agriculture To Become an Extractive Industry.....    29
Regional and Country Reviews.....................................    30
    Severe Food Insecurity.......................................    30
        Ethiopia.................................................    31
        Zambia...................................................    33
        Laos.....................................................    35
    Food Secure..................................................    38
        South Africa.............................................    39
        Costa Rica...............................................    40
    Moderately Food Insecure.....................................    42
        Improving Countries......................................    42
            Indonesia............................................    43
            Vietnam..............................................    45
        Moderately Insecure......................................    48
            The Philippines......................................    48
            Guatemala............................................    50
            Uganda...............................................    54
Conclusion.......................................................    57
Appendices.......................................................    59
    Additional Resources.........................................    59
    Global Food Security Act.....................................    60
                         LETTER OF TRANSMITTAL

                              ----------                              

                                       U.S. Senate,
                            Committee on Foreign Relations,
                                  Washington, DC, February 6, 2009.
    Dear Colleagues: Roughly one billion people suffer from 
food insecurity--they are unable to consume sufficient calories 
for a healthy and active life. Chronic hunger has its most 
pernicious effects on children, mothers, and the sick. Children 
deprived of adequate nutrients suffer from lifelong stunting 
and cognitive deficiencies. The children of women who are 
pregnant or lactating also suffer physiological consequences of 
a poor maternal diet. The sick, especially those infected with 
HIV/AIDS, are unable to fight off the effects of disease. Those 
that are well spend an inordinate amount of time and income 
trying to provide food for their families.
    The consequences of hunger are profound. Quality of life 
for affected families deteriorates as access to food decreases, 
affecting their productivity, and ultimately the economic 
growth of nations. Hungry children are unable to learn, and 
hungry adults are not productive. Hungry people are desperate 
people, and their hunger can breed instability as evidenced by 
riots in some 19 countries during the Spring and Summer of 
2008. It is both a moral and a security imperative for the 
United States and other wealthy nations to address the root 
causes of hunger.
    I recently directed minority staff of the Senate Committee 
on Foreign Relations to assess the causes and consequences of 
food insecurity in a number of countries, and to investigate 
how best to alleviate it.
    The steep spikes in food prices that occurred in 2007 and 
2008 caused some discomfort for Americans and it put an 
additional 75 million people worldwide into the category of 
hungry. Faced with a lack of access to food, poor families 
respond by cutting out more expensive, and often more 
nutritious food, followed by cutting back to one meal a day. 
With prolonged food insecurity, families often sell off farm 
animals for income, which plunges them further into poverty. 
Even a short episode of food unavailability can have very 
lengthy effects on families struggling to pull themselves out 
of poverty.
    There is little reason for anyone to be hungry in a world 
in which we have the knowledge and resources to ensure that 
everyone has access to a nutritious range of food. Just as 
technological advances of the Green Revolution spurred large 
parts of Asia to increase farm yield, so too can technology 
help to increase agricultural productivity in response to 
growing populations. However, today's challenges are more than 
increasing the availability of food. Those living in poverty 
need enough income to ensure access to a varied diet necessary 
for a productive life. Food insecurity is a problem of both 
availability and access, and both aspects must be addressed if 
we are to overcome hunger.
    This report argues that both donors and developing 
countries have neglected to make investments in agricultural 
productivity and rural development. Just as agriculture formed 
the basis for the economic development of the United States, it 
can also be the basis for sustained economic growth and 
prosperity elsewhere. Investments in farm yield, in technology 
and its dissemination to farmers, and in education are vital. 
Addressing hunger is the essence of development. Food security 
both empowers individuals and has a multiplier effect 
throughout society--raising incomes, improving nutrition and 
productivity, spreading equality, and creating jobs through 
related industries.
    I hope you find this report helpful in understanding the 
complex causes of food insecurity and the ways in which we as a 
nation can provide the leadership to solve it.
                                          Richard G. Lugar,
                                           Ranking Minority Member.


                        GLOBAL FOOD INSECURITY:
                      PERSPECTIVES FROM THE FIELD

                              ----------                              


                              Introduction

    The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimates that 
farmers will need to double current output by 2050 to satisfy 
the demand for food due to population growth, urbanization, and 
rising incomes.\1\ This is a daunting task, given that even 
today, about 1 billion people, or \1/6\th of the world's 
population, already suffer from food insecurity. That is, day 
in and day out, 1 billion people are unable to secure a 
nutritionally adequate diet to keep them healthy and active. Of 
these 1 billion people, estimates put 100 million people in the 
category of highly vulnerable to suffering from the physical 
consequences of malnutrition. Childhood malnutrition claims the 
lives of up to 5 million children each year.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \1\ FAO, ``The State of Food Insecurity in the World 2008.''
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    The effects of decades of neglect by donor and host 
governments of investments in agricultural productivity became 
apparent as food prices climbed steeply beginning in the Fall 
of 2007 and continuing into the Spring and Summer of 2008. 
While the causes of food price increases were many and varied, 
the consequences soon became clear as approximately 75 million 
additional people joined the ranks of the hungry. Estimates of 
the total number of people living in hunger are more than 900 
million.\2\ The actions by governments around the world that 
took seemingly rational steps to protect their own populations 
through trade restrictions also had a deleterious effect on 
food availability and food prices.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \2\ The World Food Program identifies 923 million people as food 
insecure, while the Economic Research Service of the U.S. Department of 
Agriculture estimates 982 million.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Much of the cause of price hikes was due to the 
unprecedented cost of petroleum that approached $150 a barrel 
by the Summer of 2008. High fuel prices drove up the costs of 
transportation and agricultural inputs such as fertilizer. 
Because many small holder farmers do not produce a surplus for 
the market, they were unable to benefit from higher commodity 
prices. Since then, gasoline prices have decreased, but food 
prices in some areas of the world remain high. More 
importantly, the crisis of 2008 demonstrated the fragility of 
global agriculture and how quickly disruptions in one area can 
spread throughout the world.
    To overcome hunger, donor and host governments should adopt 
a long-term approach that puts agricultural productivity and 
rural development at center stage. To make advances, special 
attention should be given to harnessing the power of education 
and science. Developing appropriate technologies is vital to 
this effort, but using technology to solve problems will not 
happen unless countries have the human capacity to exploit it. 
Equally, the United States must urge other nations--both 
wealthy and poor--to avoid resisting proven technologies that 
promise remarkable farm productivity payoffs, while protecting 
the environment. A rural focus will have positive effects 
throughout economies, creating new businesses and jobs, 
promoting equity, and raising incomes. Those who are poor are 
also hungry; both problems must be addressed in tandem. The 
Food and Agriculture Organization \3\ concluded, ``It is now 
widely acknowledged by most stakeholders that the role of 
agriculture and the rural economy is fundamental for securing 
sustainable gains in the fight against poverty .  .  . A 
productivity-induced agricultural expansion can ``pull'' other 
sectors with it and increase economic activity and employment 
opportunities in rural areas.'' This recognition must be 
followed by action on the part of donors and host governments 
working in partnership.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \3\ FAO, Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific: ``The State of 
Food and Agriculture in Asia and the Pacific Region, 2008.''
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

                        Purpose and Methodology

    At the direction of Ranking Member Richard G. Lugar, the 
minority staff \4\ of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee 
conducted a study of global food security as part of the 
committee's oversight responsibilities. Ensuring that all 
people are food secure is vital to U.S. national security in 
promoting a more stable and productive world. This study is 
similar in scope to previous staff reports, such as ``The 
Petroleum and Poverty Paradox'' issued in October 2008, 
``Embassies Grapple to Guide Foreign Aid'' issued in November 
2007, and ``Embassies as Command Posts'' completed in December 
2006.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \4\ This Senate Foreign Relations Committee minority staff study 
was coordinated by Connie Veillette with significant contributions from 
Jay Branegan, Dan Diller, Keith Luse, Kezia McKeague, Carl Meacham, 
Michael Phelan, and Aaron Whitesel.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Staff visited ten countries to investigate the causes of 
food insecurity. In each country, staff sought to identify the 
conditions that produce food security or insecurity, and what 
types of donor country engagements and host country policies 
are necessary to improve food security. The countries visited 
were chosen based on the Global Hunger Index (GHI) compiled by 
the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and 
supplemented by other figures on the percentage of populations 
suffering from malnutrition. Pairings of countries were chosen 
in various regions--with one being more food secure than the 
other. This produced a sample of countries demonstrating a full 
range of conditions, from food secure to chronically insecure. 
The ten countries visited were: Ethiopia, Uganda, Zambia, South 
Africa, Indonesia, Laos, Vietnam, the Philippines, Costa Rica, 
and Guatemala. Such a varied set of countries allowed a 
comprehensive picture of what causes food insecurity, and what 
government policies are conducive to development.
    Of the sample of ten countries, Ethiopia fell into the 
category of ``extremely alarming'' rates of hunger, according 
to IFPRI, while Laos and Zambia are in the ``alarming'' 
category. Those with ``serious'' rates of hunger include 
Uganda, Vietnam, Guatemala, Indonesia, and the Philippines. 
South Africa suffers from ``moderate'' hunger, with much of 
that localized among certain populations. Costa Rica has low 
rates of hunger.
    Staff met with government officials, non-governmental 
organizations, universities and research institutes, 
multilateral organizations, and international financial 
institutions during their country visits. In Washington, D.C., 
staff met with officials from the United States Agency for 
International Development, the United States Department of 
Agriculture, the World Food Program, the International Fund for 
Agricultural Development, and representatives from non-
governmental organizations, advocacy groups, and industry 
organizations.

                                Findings

    The spikes in food prices that occurred in late 2007 and 
2008 were caused by a complex web of factors, some of which are 
likely to continue. Record oil prices drove much of the food 
price increases by raising the costs of transportation and 
agricultural inputs. However, even after oil prices dropped, 
food prices remained high in much of the developing world. 
These price spikes were only the most recent and vivid signs of 
a trend that has been growing. After decades of declining food 
prices, FAO's real food price index started to increase in 
2002. By 2008, food prices were 64% higher than in 2002. The 
FAO reports rapid increases in chronic hunger during the 2003 
to 2005 period in addition to that of 2007 to 2008. Last year, 
some 75 million additional people became undernourished. FAO 
estimates that there are 80 million more chronically hungry 
people in the world today than in the early 1990s.
    The world's population is expected to grow, largely in the 
developing world, so that current food demand will double by 
2050. An additional factor driving food demand and price 
increases is the growing prosperity in such countries as China 
and India that has resulted in greater consumption of food 
containing more protein. Preferences for meat and dairy 
products drive the demand for more commodities to feed 
livestock.
    This expected demand will necessitate much higher 
agricultural productivity globally. Increasing farm yield is 
vital, but not sufficient for alleviating hunger. Hunger and 
poverty are two sides of the same coin. Addressing one can 
improve the other. Hunger is a problem of both low farm yield 
and lack of access to food. Rural land holders are not 
producing sufficient quantities and variety of food to provide 
for their families. They are also often unable to produce a 
surplus that would provide them with the additional income to 
access other foodstuffs in the marketplace, or to purchase 
other life necessities such as medications, or to keep their 
children in school. The urban poor and the rural landless 
suffer from access problems, driven by low income and high food 
prices. Both availability and access problems require sustained 
investments in farm productivity to stabilize prices, and more 
opportunities to raise incomes. A World Bank publication makes 
the case that investments in agriculture are a necessary 
component to addressing poverty: ``Agriculture alone will not 
be enough to massively reduce poverty but poverty reduction 
will not happen without agriculture.'' \5\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \5\ ``Making Agriculture a Development Priority,'' Development 
Outreach, World Bank, October 2008.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    The findings of this report include:
     High food prices threaten to erase recent advances 
in alleviating extreme poverty.
     Demand from growing and wealthier populations will 
continue to test the world's ability to feed itself.
     The use of technology, education, research, and 
extension are weak in chronically food insecure countries. 
National agricultural research and extension services are 
equally in poor shape and have not been able to contribute to 
economic growth.
     Some populations--children, women, and the ill--
are more vulnerable to undernourishment and are affected to a 
greater degree by fluctuations in food prices and availability.
     Wealthy countries have based their development on 
a strong agricultural sector, and that sector has been the 
foundation for industry and commerce.
     Agriculture in poor nations can provide a 
multiplier effect for development, spurring new business and 
industry, building new markets, raising incomes, improving 
nutrition and health, and ensuring that children stay in 
school, among other benefits.
     Some middle income countries have segments of 
their populations that are food insecure, representing serious 
equity problems that can have implications for political 
stability.
     Attention to small and medium holders can produce 
high rates of return. Basic investments in better fertilizer, 
seed, and irrigation can produce fast and high returns.
     The burden of food insecurity falls hardest on 
women who are often heads of households. Providing them 
assistance has multiple benefits ranging from higher incomes, 
better childhood nutrition, and reduced school drop-out rates.
     Trying to support a growing population by 
expanding land under cultivation would have drastic 
environmental effects. Instead, policymakers should seek to get 
more production from existing farmland in order to prevent 
deforestation, soil erosion, and the adverse effects of climate 
change, and to improve farm yield. Investments in science and 
technology are necessary to overcome potential environmental 
problems.
     The United States has the opportunity to advance 
its humanitarian goals by leading a global campaign to 
eradicate hunger. It is in the U.S. national interest to 
promote global food security.
     Food secure countries have certain characteristics 
that are not shared by moderately and very insecure countries. 
The former have benefitted from government policies that are 
conducive to agriculture and rural development, with a history 
of investments in agriculture, infrastructure, education and 
research, extension, and stable land tenure systems.
     By contrast, very insecure countries are marked by 
government policies that do not support agriculture, including 
weak public investment in farming, poor infrastructure, weak 
university and agricultural research systems, poor or 
nonfunctioning extension services, and unstable land tenure and 
farm size.
     Moderately insecure countries share many of the 
characteristics of the very insecure but have shown a higher 
commitment to the rural sector.

                            Recommendations

    Fighting hunger should be a centerpiece of U.S. foreign 
assistance policy. The eradication of global hunger serves U.S. 
national security interests and reflects the humanitarian 
nature of the American people. Hunger and poverty are 
destabilizing forces. Food riots that occurred in 2008 
demonstrate the volatility of food insecure populations. 
Investments in agriculture, education, and technology have a 
multiplier effect, forming the basis of related development, 
creating jobs and business opportunities, raising incomes of 
those living in poverty, and improving health. The United 
States, working with other wealthy nations, should lead this 
effort.
    The Committee staff developed specific recommendations that 
should guide U.S. foreign assistance policy and approaches.
    (1) Donor countries and host governments need to increase 
resources for agricultural productivity and rural development.
    (a) Foreign assistance programs and projects should be 
responsive to national development plans, but should also 
encourage governments of developing countries to make greater 
investments in agriculture and rural development.
    (b) Foreign assistance projects should be better 
coordinated among donor agencies at the country level. 
Coordination should encompass a set of development principles 
that respond to the development needs of each host country, and 
that include a division of labor among donors when appropriate.
    (2) Strengthening national agriculture research and 
extension services is key to increasing farm yield and raising 
incomes.
    (a) U.S. foreign assistance should seek to strengthen 
extension services so that small and medium holders benefit 
from learning more productive and sustainable farming 
techniques. A special emphasis on reaching women, many of whom 
are the sole income earner of the family, should be 
incorporated into extension programs.
    (b) U.S. foreign assistance should help improve 
agricultural research programs, whether they are governmental, 
private, or university-based. Research programs should include 
a public outreach component so that information is available to 
those who need it. In some situations, instructing researchers 
in English would help integrate them into international 
research exchange of information.
    (c) U.S. policy should help countries understand the 
benefits of biotechnology, including GM, and support the 
development of regulatory frameworks that would facilitate its 
adoption while responding to concerns about its application.
    (3) Institutions of higher education can play a vital role 
in increasing human capacity and disseminating knowledge.
    (a) U.S. programs, such as the Collaborative Research 
Support Program (CRSP), should be strengthened so that U.S. 
universities can partner with foreign universities on specific 
research agendas.
    (b) A program should be established to assist foreign 
universities to strengthen their agriculture departments, 
including teaching and research capabilities. Such a program 
should also engage with U.S. universities through faculty, 
student, and administrator exchanges. U.S. assistance to 
strategically located universities with capable facilities can 
help them serve as regional hubs for a network of university 
activity in the field of agriculture.
    (c) Existing international research centers should 
participate in the development of globally networked 
agricultural universities in order to disseminate the benefits 
of research and to build research capacity.
    (4) The focus needs to be on small and medium land holders 
to achieve near term agricultural productivity gains and to 
address extreme poverty.
    (a) Strengthened extension programs are vital to helping 
small holders increase their yield and farm in ways that are 
environmentally sustainable.
    (b) Programs should empower individuals by giving them the 
tools and incentives to produce surpluses and to participate 
and help create vibrant rural economies. Emergency food 
assistance should be designed so as to prevent dependency. 
Rather, such programs should include components that 
incentivize economic activity.
    (5) Commercial agriculture should not be neglected. 
Increasing its capacity and providing productive linkages with 
small and medium holders should be an objective.
    (a) In countries having food supply problems, relying on 
commercial agriculture to achieve higher levels of food 
production should be encouraged. Providing for an environment 
that supports more investments is an important component. 
Commercial operations that have related industries or business 
activities provide opportunities for job creation for the rural 
poor and landless.
    (b) Programs that encourage small and medium holders to 
increase their production for commercial sale or to produce 
components needed by large enterprises promote important 
horizontal linkages.
    (6) Host government capacity to design and implement sound 
policies needs to be strengthened.
    (a) U.S. assistance should incorporate good governance, 
anti-corruption, and strengthening of civil society.
    (b) Government policies to improve productivity should work 
with and complement free market principles rather than 
distorting markets.
    (c) In many cases, assistance to government ministries that 
oversee agriculture, science and research, and education is 
necessary.
    (7) Investments in infrastructure are necessary--better 
roads, markets, irrigation systems.
    (a) U.S. foreign assistance programs should coordinate with 
other donors on transportation infrastructure projects to 
economize resources.
    (b) The Millennium Challenge Corporation should continue to 
finance infrastructure.
    (c) Complementary development projects should be designed 
around major infrastructure works.
    (d) Irrigation, of all types and sizes, is necessary to 
increase agriculture productivity.
    (8) The design of agriculture programs and projects should 
pay special attention to issues of land tenure. Without 
ownership, farmers are often unable to access capital and do 
not have the incentives to make improvements to their farming 
operations.
    (9) U.S. assistance programs and projects should 
incorporate assistance to women who often bear an inordinate 
burden in caring for their families and in earning an income.
    (a) The special needs of female head-of-household farmers 
should be addressed in the design of projects.
    (b) Training in childhood nutrition should be incorporated 
into the design of agriculture projects for women.
    (10) In responding to changing climatic conditions in many 
parts of the world, sustainable agriculture or conservation 
farming techniques should be employed to conserve water and 
prevent soil degradation and deforestation.
    (11) Free markets should be allowed to work, but price 
stability should be the goal so that wild price fluctuations 
are avoided.
    (12) Small farmers must have access to credit in order to 
purchase inputs and make investments in their farming 
operations.
    (13) Governments of developing countries should show 
caution in response to proposals by foreign governments and 
corporations to farm vast tracks of land for export. These 
types of operations, if not designed with transparency, run the 
risk of becoming an extractive industry, with the attendant 
vulnerabilities to corruption and lack of benefits to the home 
country.
    (14) The international donor community must come together 
at the country level to better coordinate aid activities, 
starting with agreements on development principles and working 
with host governments to adhere to national development plans.

                          The Nature of Hunger

    According to the World Food Program, there are 
approximately 923 million people who suffer from chronic food 
insecurity. Day in and day out, nearly 1 billion people, or 
about \1/6\th of the world's population, struggle to secure 
enough food to eat. Chronic hunger is a structural problem. 
Either the system of food production is not adequate to meet 
the needs of everyone, or the means of accessing food is not 
sufficient. Chronic hunger can be exacerbated by man-made and 
natural disasters and can turn a chronically food insecure 
situation into famine.
    Zimbabwe was once considered a breadbasket for southern 
Africa, but now 60% of its population subsists on one meal a 
day, according to the World Food Program. A cholera outbreak 
there makes the hungry even more vulnerable to death. 
Zimbabwe's situation is due to government policies that 
politicized land tenure and the agriculture sector, and were 
exacerbated by natural disasters. Civil war in Darfur has 
produced 3 million refugees and prevents farmers from working 
their fields.
    Sub-Saharan Africa \6\ suffers from higher rates of hunger 
than any other region. Its hunger index \7\ (GHI), as 
calculated by the International Food Policy Research Institute, 
averages nearly 25, just slightly ahead of South Asia. By 
comparison, the world average is 15 points, with Southeast 
Asia, the Near East and North Africa, and Latin America all 
below 10 points. Since 1990, many countries have seen improved 
hunger indices, while others have fallen further behind. Of the 
countries studied in this report, Vietnam has experienced a 47% 
improvement in its GHI, while Zambia has slightly worsened. It 
is clear that some regions of the world, particularly Africa, 
are worse off than in previous decades, as evidenced by 
changing levels of food aid. Africa's share of all food aid 
donated globally has increased from one third in the late 1990s 
to one half today.\8\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \6\ Throughout the report, Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa are used 
interchangeably.
    \7\ IFPRI's Global Hunger Index calculates food insecurity based on 
three factors: the under-five mortality rate, the prevalence of 
underweight children, and the proportion of the population considered 
undernourished. Its latest figures reflect data as of 2006. Because the 
figures are based on data obtained prior to the food price hikes in 
2007 and 2008, it is probable that hunger has worsened in many 
countries.
    \8\ U.S. Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service, 
``Food Security Assessment, 2007.''
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Chronic hunger is strongly correlated with poverty. 
Populations living in extreme poverty--those eking out an 
existence on less than 50 cents a day--are the same who suffer 
from the worst food insecurity. Often living in remote rural 
areas with few assets and little access to fertilizer, better 
seed varieties, and modern farming implements, they are unable 
to feed themselves or produce enough income to access food. A 
chronic state of hunger further diminishes their productivity. 
IFPRI estimates that worldwide some 162 million people live in 
extreme poverty. Another 323 million live on 50 to 75 cents a 
day. About 485 million people exist on 75 cents to $1.00 each 
day.
    Increases in food prices have exacerbated poverty rates as 
the poor spend more of their resources and energy to feed 
themselves. While the world saw steady declines in food prices 
since 1974, according to the International Monetary Fund, 
prices have increased steeply since 2005. The FAO's food price 
index showed an increase of 9% in 2006, 23% in 2007, and 50% 
between May 2007 and May 2008. Wheat and poultry prices doubled 
since 2003, maize tripled, and rice more than quadrupled. Those 
who suffer from chronic food insecurity are in especially 
precarious positions when prices increase.
    The poorest of the poor can spend up to 70% of their 
incomes on food. When prices increase, their access to food is 
affected, leading them to restrict consumption. Long-term 
hunger has pernicious and lasting physical effects that are 
particularly hard on children. Children, especially those under 
two years of age, who are deprived of adequate nutrition suffer 
permanent effects, such as stunting, cognitive deficiencies, 
and increased vulnerability to disease that results in higher 
mortality rates. These conditions are often not reversible and 
have potentially enduring effects on their future productivity 
and that of their communities. It is often the case, as well, 
that families who need to spend inordinate amounts of time and 
funds securing food are unable to afford to send their children 
to school. Their lack of education will perpetuate poverty.
    The economic growth of nations can be affected by long-term 
hunger as the productivity of food insecure people is affected. 
Those in extreme poverty often must resort to selling off their 
assets. In rural communities, this means selling farm animals, 
which limits resilience to future crises and reduces access to 
milk. Higher prices also reduce the amount of food that can be 
distributed by feeding programs.

                        Why the Need for Action

    Global food production is not keeping pace with population 
growth. By 2050 it is projected that population growth will 
require a doubling in farm output, yet growth rates in food 
production in some regions have stagnated. Worldwide, grain 
yield has been growing by about 2.5% a year. Africa's grain 
yield growth has been only about 1%. Meanwhile, its annual 
population growth rate in 2007 was 2.4%.\9\ FAO reports that 
per capita production of Africa's most important staple crop--
maize--has decreased by 14% since 1980, reflecting both 
population growth and low productivity. The World Resources 
Institute reports that Africa's total agriculture production on 
a per capita basis in 2005 was 19% less than in 1970.\10\ Much 
of Africa is now chronically dependent on donor food aid 
shipments.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \9\ World Development Indicators 2007, World Bank.
    \10\ Paarlberg, Robert, Starved for Science, 2008.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Population growth will put increasing stress on land, 
water, and energy supplies, and will exacerbate the effects of 
climate change. Increasing acreage under cultivation will not 
facilitate the necessary doubling of farm output. Although 
planted acreage can be increased productively in some areas, an 
overreliance on this step will cause widespread deforestation 
and put significant stress on local ecologies and water 
supplies. As poor populations become wealthier, diets diversify 
to incorporate more protein sources causing a growing 
proportion of food production to go toward livestock feed. As 
traditional energy sources are depleted, higher fuel prices 
will continue to put pressure on the development of biofuels.
    These factors demonstrate that the focus of efforts to 
increase agricultural productivity must center on empowering 
people with the tools and information necessary to raise 
production on currently cultivated land. They also demonstrate 
that humanitarian efforts should place more emphasis on a long-
term solution rather than depending on short-term provision of 
food aid. In fiscal year 2007, the United States provided 
$1.665 billion in P.L. 480 food shipments, but only $433 
million in agriculture assistance. In Africa, the U.S. provided 
$1.22 billion in food aid compared to just $121 million to help 
farmer productivity.
    In the days of Malthus, people also worried that food 
production would not keep pace with a growing population. But 
Malthus and his contemporaries did not see the role that 
technology and innovation would play to forestall his dire 
predictions. They did not foresee the Green Revolution that was 
spurred by the work of Nobel Laureate Norman Borlaug and 
others. Today we must not allow an aversion to modern 
agricultural technology to doom a part of the world's 
population to chronic hunger and poverty, and to threaten the 
developed world with higher food prices. We can either succumb 
to Malthusian pessimism, or embrace the Borlaugian faith in 
overcoming challenges through science and technology.
    Negative trends in food security are projected to continue 
in many parts of the world. The U.S. Department of 
Agriculture's Economic Research Service projects that the 
number of undernourished people in Africa alone will increase 
by 10% over the next 10 years, possibly even reaching 645 
million by 2017. In addition, gains that had been made in Asia 
are stalling. The situation will be exacerbated by slowing 
economic growth in response to the current financial crisis, 
continued volatility in food and fuel prices, high rates of 
population growth in already poor parts of the world, and the 
effects of climate change. While it is estimated that food 
security in Latin America and the Caribbean will remain stable 
or improve, certain low income countries will not see 
improvements. Food insecurity in Haiti and Guatemala is 
projected to increase, and others such as Honduras and El 
Salvador will have to rely on increased grain imports.\11\ The 
environmental impact of climate change is being felt in many 
parts of the world with an increase in volatile fluctuations 
between drought and rainfall, further affecting farm output.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \11\ USDA, Economic Research Service, ``Food Security Assessment, 
2007''.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    The steep price increase that occurred in 2007 and 2008 
laid bare some of the underlying structural factors that are 
cause for concern. While low food prices had been the norm for 
many decades, prices began to increase in 2002, and grain 
prices spiked by about 50% from 2005 to 2007, according to the 
U.S. Department of Agriculture. It is projected that 90% of 
this price increase will persist during the next decade. In the 
2002 to 2006 period, price increases for those staples that 
constitute more than 60% of diets in developing countries were 
steep enough to bring about changes in consumption patterns. 
Corn prices increased by nearly 30%, wheat by 20%, soybean oil 
by 18%, and sugar by more than 80%.\12\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \12\ Ibid. ERS estimates that grains constitute 63% of diets in 
low-income Asian countries, and nearly half of those in Africa.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    The 2007 and 2008 price hikes further worsened an already 
precarious situation. The International Monetary Fund estimated 
that from January 2007 to January 2008, aggregate food prices 
increased by 33%. Many countries are net importers of food. 
Higher international commodity prices limit their capacity to 
maintain sufficient levels of food imports. Eleven countries in 
Africa rely on imports for more than 50% of grain supplies. The 
increase in oil prices exerted upward pressure on food prices 
as transportation costs were driven higher.
    The need for action seems self-evident on moral, economic, 
and security grounds. Drawing on the humanitarian nature of the 
American public, there is a clear moral imperative to help 
families overcome hunger, and recent public opinion polls show 
that Americans believe the country should do more to address 
global hunger.\13\ Advances that have been made in recent years 
to alleviate poverty and improve health are threatened by 
worsening food access and availability. This reversal is 
already evident by measuring the number of malnourished that 
increased from 2006 to 2008. Previous gains achieved in 
promoting health could be threatened by the physiological 
effects of malnourishment that diminish the body's ability to 
fight disease and fend off infection. Even common diseases that 
are easily overcome will be the source of increased mortality 
in a chronically malnourished body.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \13\ The Chicago Council on Global Affairs conducted a survey on 
American public opinion in 2008. It showed that support for addressing 
hunger, health, and agricultural productivity was stronger than for 
poverty or development.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Global economic growth is considered to benefit all 
nations. It increases customers for U.S. products and provides 
less expensive products for American consumers. From a 
budgetary perspective, the past investments in the form of U.S. 
development assistance may be erased by the consequences of 
high food prices in the developing world. As economic growth 
stalls in developing nations, they will be less able to 
purchase U.S. goods and services. Conversely, as incomes rise 
in the developing world, nations will be less dependent on U.S. 
foreign assistance.
    Finally, global food security can produce a more peaceful 
and stable world. According to IFPRI, violent food protests 
took place in 19 countries from January 2007 to June 2008. Six 
of those countries are considered to be moderately food 
insecure, 7 are seriously food insecure, and 6 have alarming 
rates of hunger. Of the countries studied in this report, 
Indonesia had violent food riots, while non-violent protests 
occurred in South Africa, Guatemala, the Philippines, and 
Ethiopia.

                     Issues Affecting Food Security

    Staff identified several factors that contribute to food 
security. When these factors are present, staff found that 
hunger and poverty rates were lower than in countries where the 
factors were absent. Pivotal factors include: investments in 
agriculture and rural development; investments in 
infrastructure; investments in education, technology, science, 
and extension; sound land tenure systems; and a healthy respect 
for market forces. All of these factors require the sustained 
engagement of governments in developing public policies that 
promote equitable economic growth.
    Table 1 indicates the countries under study and the main 
variables used to assess them. IFPRI's Global Hunger Index 
(GHI) and the proportion of the population reported to be 
malnourished were used to categorize countries as either: food 
secure; moderately insecure; or very insecure. Food secure 
countries have very low GHIs, although they may have sizeable 
populations that are considered malnourished. The very insecure 
are countries that have chronic hunger problems, very high 
hunger indices, and require significant food donations. The 
moderately insecure are those that have middle-range hunger 
indices, but are not chronically reliant on food aid. Sometimes 
these countries can even be net exporters of food.
    This study attempts to make some generalizations based on 
the data collected for these ten countries. It should be noted, 
however, that the small number of countries in this sample is 
inadequate for robust conclusions per the standards of social 
scientific inquiry. Yet, some initial conclusions can be drawn, 
and those conclusions can be further tested with the addition 
of more case studies. None of the conclusions presented here 
sharply contradict those of other studies. However, whereas 
other studies have looked at one or two causal factors, this 
study has attempted to examine a larger number.
    Those conclusions are listed here, and a more expansive 
discussion of each then follows.
     Food secure countries all have certain 
characteristics that are not necessarily shared by moderately 
and very insecure countries. The differences between food 
secure and very food insecure are quite stark. The two food 
secure countries in the study have benefitted from government 
policies that are conducive to agriculture and rural 
development; a good natural resource base; investments in 
agriculture; good infrastructure; strong universities and 
research centers supporting agriculture; either good or 
previously good extension services; sound and stable land 
tenure including adequate farm size; peace and stability; and 
policies that are not hostile to genetically modified (GM) 
technology.
     By contrast, the very insecure are marked by 
government policies that do not support agriculture; little 
government investment in agriculture; poor infrastructure; weak 
university and agriculture research systems; very poor or non-
existent extension services; and very poor land tenure and farm 
size. One of the three is hostile to GM technology (Zambia), 
while the other two have neither rejected nor embraced it.
     The moderately insecure share many characteristics 
with the very insecure. In these countries, government policies 
are weak in supporting agriculture, and government investments 
in agriculture have been anemic. Infrastructure is undeveloped; 
extension services are poor or non-functional; and land tenure 
and farm size are poor to moderately poor. But like secure 
countries, every country in this category is not hostile to GM 
technology, with two out of the five embracing its use (Vietnam 
and the Philippines). Governments in this category appear to be 
making greater investments in agriculture than those of the 
very insecure.
     It is clear that when governments implement 
transparent policies that provide support for rural development 
and agricultural markets, food security improves. This includes 
policies that attempt to work with, rather than distorting, 
market forces, and where policies are driven more by need than 
by cronyism or other political factors.
     It is less clear the degree to which having a good 
natural resource base is important. Some countries are just too 
poor to be able to exploit their resource base. Others, with 
resource deficits, may be able to overcome them. The components 
studied by staff included: the percentage of arable land; 
access to water; the effects of climate change; and 
deforestation rates. Two very insecure countries (Ethiopia and 
Zambia) were judged to have good or adequate resources.
     Where governments have invested budgetary 
resources into long term agricultural development, food 
security improves. Staff distinguished between rhetorical and 
real support, and excluded funding from the donor community.
     Infrastructure was judged to be poor in all 
countries but the food secure. Lack of roads and irrigation 
systems is a factor that limits food security regardless of the 
presence or absence of other characteristics.
     Extension services are very poor in all countries 
except the food secure. Poor countries suffer from many factors 
that contribute to a lack of effective extension, but nearly 
all officials meeting with staff expressed very strongly the 
need to increase the number of agents and their effectiveness.
     Farmers who hold stable title to their land, can 
use it for collateral, and have access to enough land on which 
to make a living, all live in countries that are food secure. 
Very insecure countries score very low on this characteristic, 
while the moderately insecure score marginally better.
     The presence of peace and stability shows that 
this is a necessary, but not sufficient condition. Food secure 
countries are peaceful and stable; those with instability and 
conflict tend to be less food secure. But countries with peace 
and stability can still be very food insecure. Peace and 
stability do not cause food security, but they are beneficial 
to it.
     Most countries studied here do not reject GM 
technology; only one is hostile to it. Most others do not 
prohibit it, but neither do they embrace it. In many cases, 
this is due to a lack of resources to study or implement 
regulatory frameworks to guide its adoption. This is an area 
where U.S. support could have positive benefits.
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7215A.001

                               Discussion

    Agriculture and Rural Development Investments. Staff found 
that countries with long histories of investing in agriculture 
and rural development are generally food secure. While Costa 
Rica and South Africa have some segments of their populations 
that suffer from malnourishment, both have pursued policies 
that support agriculture. This is consistent with the 
development trajectories of most developed countries. Countries 
that are struggling with food insecurity are also those that 
neglected agriculture.
    Developing countries are dependent on agriculture for much 
of their GDP yet investments in rural areas have fallen 
precipitously as nations have put resources into other sectors. 
As a result, agricultural productivity has also fallen. Nations 
have been lulled into complacency by decades of low food 
prices. As long as the growth in global food production was 
greater than population growth, the situation was sustainable. 
But demands on the world's farmers have increased, from 
population growth and demand for non-food crops, at the same 
time that agricultural productivity has stagnated.
    Africa has been particularly affected, with grain yield 
increasing by only 1% annually compared to 2.5% in the rest of 
the world. In 2006, yield in Africa was just 40% of that in 
other developing nations.\14\ The FAO reports that per capita 
production of Africa's most important staple crop--maize--has 
decreased by 14% since 1980. As suggested by a Chicago Council 
on Global Affairs report, the degradation in agricultural 
productivity coupled with population growth has doubled the 
number of people in Africa living in extreme poverty, from 150 
million in 1980 to 300 million today.\15\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \14\ Government Accountability Organization: ``International Food 
Security: Insufficient Efforts by Host Governments and Donors Threaten 
Progress to Halve Hunger in Sub-Saharan Africa by 2015,'' May 2008.
    \15\ The Chicago Initiative on Global Agricultural Development, 
``Renewing American Leadership in the Fight Against Global Hunger and 
Poverty,'' Chicago Council on Global Affairs, December 2008.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Donor governments have also neglected agriculture with 
official development assistance (ODA) allocated for agriculture 
falling to just 4% of total ODA in 2007. In Africa, with very 
high rates of poverty and low productivity, total agriculture 
ODA in 1989 was $4.1 billion compared to $1.9 billion in 2006. 
U.S. assistance for agriculture declined from more than $1 
billion annually in the 1980s to as little as $200 million in 
2003, when figured in constant 2006 dollars. (See Table 2.) 
Despite the commitments made by developed countries in the 1996 
Rome Declaration on World Food Security, greater investments in 
agriculture have not occurred.
    Of the countries studied here, large portions of their 
populations are employed in agriculture, ranging from 69% in 
Uganda, 60% in Vietnam, 45% in Indonesia, and 39% in Guatemala, 
according to the World Bank. Most of the developing world's 
population live in rural areas, including 88% in Uganda, 84% in 
Ethiopia, 80% in Laos, and 74% in Vietnam. Agriculture accounts 
for 47% of Laos' GDP, 44% of Ethiopia's GDP, and 43% Uganda's 
GDP.
    Countries that have continued to make investments in 
agriculture are more food secure. Costa Rica and South Africa 
are examples of countries with high farm productivity and low 
rates of hunger. Both have seen their agricultural productivity 
increase from 1990, as calculated by the World Bank. According 
to IFPRI's Global Hunger Index, South Africa achieved a 33% 
improvement from 1990 to 2007 and Costa Rica gained by 36%. 
Other countries, while still considered food insecure, have 
made great strides, such as Vietnam with a 47% improvement, and 
Indonesia with a 29% improvement in their hunger indices.
    Despite the importance of agriculture to their economies, 
many developing countries devote scant resources to it. The 
World Bank reports that for most agriculture-based countries, 
public investment in agriculture approximated just 4% of 
agriculture GDP in 2004. By comparison, Asian countries 
invested some 10% during the 1980s when the region experienced 
rapid increases in agricultural growth.\16\ Efforts such as the 
Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) 
that call for member countries to allocate at least 10% of 
their budgets for agriculture are encouraging. However, most 
countries that have committed to this target have not reached 
it,\17\ and staff found that much of the support for 
agriculture is more rhetorical than real. Zambia, for example, 
had increased its agriculture budget in recent years to around 
8%, but that level has now fallen to a little over 5%.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \16\ ``A Window of Opportunity for Poor Farmers: Investing for 
Long-Term Food Supply,'' Development Outreach, World Bank, October 
2008.
    \17\ According to IFPRI and GAO, only four countries have met the 
10% target: Malawi, Ethiopia, Mali, and Burkina Faso.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    However, judging a country's commitment to agriculture by 
its budget support is problematic. Not all budget resources 
actually contribute to agricultural productivity and long-term 
development. This is particularly the case in countries that 
spend significant resources on fertilizer support programs and 
grain reserves. Staff found that such programs were often 
mismanaged and politically driven. For example, 37% of Zambia's 
budget for agriculture is devoted to the Fertilizer Support 
Program, while less than 5% is devoted to infrastructure and 
irrigation development. Investments in extension services are 
very deficient. Staff found that most countries had poor to 
non-existent extension, and very few had plans to put more 
resources there.
    Farmers generally lack access to agricultural inputs that 
can increase their yield. This is particularly true in Africa 
where both fertilizer and pesticide use is only 5% of the world 
average, according to the FAO. Farmers rely on sowing their 
fields by hand or with the help of draft animals. In Africa, 
there are just 1.1 tractors per 1,000 hectares, compared to 
19.1 worldwide. Mechanized farming in Africa is a distant 
dream. Improved seeds could also increase yield, and their 
adoption in Asia has been widely accepted since the Green 
Revolution. In Asia, at least 80% of crops are planted with 
improved varieties of rice, maize, sorghum, and potatoes. This 
contrasts with only 20%-40% of crop area in Africa.
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7215A.002

    Infrastructure Investments. Staff found that food secure 
countries benefit from having a transportation network that 
includes primary, secondary, and tertiary road systems that 
facilitate the movement of crops from farms to developed 
markets. Only Costa Rica and South Africa fit this category. 
All other countries visited had serious deficiencies in their 
transportation networks. Irrigation systems and access to clean 
water were also found more frequently in food secure countries.
    Significant populations are excluded from participating in 
markets because of the lack of infrastructure. Those in rural 
areas must transport their crops, often on foot, to markets 
miles away from their farms. The World Bank reports that less 
than 50% of the rural population in Africa lives close to a 
usable road. Only 32% of Ethiopians and a little over half of 
Guatemalans live within 2 km of an all season road. Staff 
visited sites in most of the countries under study where 
farmers were forced to walk many miles on dirt tracks to access 
markets for their produce. In the case of dairy farmers, they 
must get their milk to a collection facility within one hour to 
prevent spoilage.
    While good roads are vital to improving infrastructure, 
investments in irrigation systems are also important to raising 
productivity, particularly in areas prone to droughts. In some 
countries, water resources are sufficient, but farmers do not 
have access. Solutions as simple as treadle pumps have been 
able to improve the productivity of some farmers, but the need 
far outpaces the resources that have been devoted to small-
scale irrigation. The World Bank reported that many food 
insecure countries have very little irrigated land, as low as 
0.1% in Uganda, 2.6% in Ethiopia, 2.8% in Zambia, and 6.4% in 
Guatemala. The FAO reports that the percentage of irrigated 
land in Africa is less than 1% compared to 5.4% worldwide. 
Irrigation can double farm yield over that of rainfed crops, 
and investments in irrigation have been shown to have rates of 
return approximating 15% to 20% in Asia and Africa.\18\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \18\ ``A Window of Opportunity for Poor Farmers: Investing for 
Long-Term Food Supply,'' Development Outreach, World Bank, October 
2008.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Both--roads and irrigation--are necessary if rural areas 
are to be revitalized and agricultural productivity increased. 
Many donor countries, including the United States, have 
refrained from doing large infrastructure projects in recent 
years, leaving that function to the World Bank. It was only 
with the sizeable compacts of the Millennium Challenge 
Corporation that the value of building infrastructure was 
highlighted again. In many countries, MCC, working to support 
the host countries' development plans, has built roads linking 
farms to markets, and markets to export facilities.

    Education, Technology, Science, and Extension Investments. 
Staff found that food secure countries have made investments in 
the teaching of agricultural sciences, the dissemination of 
technology through extension services, and an agricultural 
research capacity. Schools and research institutes in Costa 
Rica and South Africa are robust. The very food insecure--Laos, 
Zambia, and Ethiopia--have failed to develop institutions that 
can effectively develop and disseminate agriculture technology. 
The moderately food insecure have some capacity that needs 
enhancement. The extent of extension services was found to be 
weak or nonfunctional in most countries. South Africa's 
extension network is considered to have atrophied in recent 
years, but its history of being stronger most likely 
contributed to the country's food security.
    The world's major agricultural producing nations have long 
made significant investments in education, extension, and 
research. U.S. agriculture has benefitted immensely from the 
land-grant college system that improved farm technology and 
disseminated information to farmers. Investments in research 
have been made by both public and private entities. By 
comparison, public and private investment in agricultural 
research and development in developing countries is just \1/
9\th that of developed countries.\19\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \19\ Ibid.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    In developing countries, this aspect of agriculture has 
been seriously neglected. Higher education budgets are anemic, 
university laboratories are in disrepair if they exist at all, 
and a general brain drain persists as students flock to other 
countries for education and then often do not return home. 
Staff found that most countries have at least one university 
with an agricultural science department, but that they are 
lacking in staff holding advanced degrees and have insufficient 
teaching capacities. Little research is conducted there and 
they rarely participate in any extension activities. Students 
who graduate with agricultural science degrees have 
traditionally gone into government service, but with cutbacks 
in budget resources for agriculture, this avenue has been 
limited in many countries. Schools are not teaching the 
entrepreneurial skills necessary for graduates to create 
productive ventures. Agriculture is a business, but 
agricultural schools are not teaching business skills.
    Two types of donor engagement are necessary--collaborative 
research and institutional capacity building. The USAID-funded 
Collaborative Research Support Program (CRSP) links U.S. land 
grant and other colleges with foreign universities on shared 
research agendas. In existence since passage of the Famine 
Prevention and Freedom from Hunger Act in 1975 (PL94-161), CRSP 
has involved dozens of U.S. universities and foreign 
universities in fields such as pest management, sustainable 
agriculture, and research on specific crops such as sorghum and 
peanuts. USAID has also supported international research 
centers, such as the Consultative Group on International 
Agriculture Research (CGIAR) with 15 research centers around 
the world. As leading proponents of agriculture technology, the 
CGIAR centers are contributing to global food production in 
regions in which they are located.
    Programs to help build teaching and research capacity at 
universities have not been robustly funded by donors. 
Universities are not able to contribute to economic growth in 
their current state, but they have the potential to become 
engines of development with the proper engagement. Well-
qualified graduates can create their own opportunities and add 
to commercial development. University-based research can 
develop solutions to localized agricultural conditions. 
Increasing human capacity, which comes through education, is as 
important as improving institutional capacity. A program to 
address these development needs should be an important 
component of U.S. assistance.
    Staff found that the two food secure countries studied--
Costa Rica and South Africa--both had numerous universities 
with advanced research facilities, competent staffs, and 
diverse curriculum. Their graduates have many opportunities in 
agriculture-related industries and their agriculture 
departments are thriving. Staff concluded that some of these 
schools can serve as regional hubs to assist other schools 
improve their agriculture programs. Staff also found that some 
schools in food insecure countries are poised to benefit from 
assistance, and that such investments could provide long-term 
and sustainable vibrancy to weak agriculture systems and 
promote needed economic growth.
    Staff visited one or more universities in each country. 
Three universities, two in South Africa and one in Costa Rica, 
were observed to be in positions to assist other countries in 
their regions to develop improved teaching and research 
capabilities. Staff did not attempt to catalogue all schools 
that could fill this leadership role. The following schools 
were among those staff visited and judged to be in a position 
to serve as regional hubs for agricultural education:
     University of Pretoria, South Africa. UP has a 
variety of agricultural science programs and degrees offered 
and has excellent research facilities that attract students and 
researchers from other parts of the continent. Staff visited 
first-class laboratories where faculty and students were 
actively engaged in advanced research projects. The school has 
sophisticated laboratories with \3/4\ of its graduate students 
from other countries, largely African. The school is committed 
to working with other universities on the continent on 
agriculture programs, and reports being limited only by 
staffing demands.
     University of Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa. K-Natal 
is South Africa's largest university with 43,000 students and 
has various agriculture programs, including an inter-
disciplinary Food Security Program begun eight years ago. The 
school is involved in advising CAADP on its policy framework 
for food security promoting the following objectives: to 
improve resilience of the food insecure; to increase 
agricultural productivity; to provide economic opportunity for 
the vulnerable, and to improve nutrition. K-Natal is working 
with other universities and governments on food security. It 
currently has cooperative programs with four African 
universities.
     EARTH University, Costa Rica. EARTH University 
(Escuela de Agricultura de la Region Tropical Humeda) is a 
private, international institution that was established thanks 
to a group of Costa Rican leaders from government, agro-
industry, and academia, with significant financial support from 
USAID and the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. It was inspired by the 
need for entirely new approaches in higher education in 
agriculture. The University is an international learning 
community, with students from 24 countries, primarily Latin 
American and Caribbean, but including 4 African nations.
    The mission of EARTH is to prepare leaders with ethical 
values to contribute to the sustainable development of the 
humid tropics and to construct a prosperous and just society. 
Higher education in agriculture in many parts of the world has 
typically focused on the training of public sector employees. 
In an age of shrinking public sector expenditures and growing 
interest in the role of the private sector in revitalizing 
rural economies, this emphasis is increasingly being 
questioned. EARTH was created with an eye towards preparing 
graduates for the private sector, and particularly for careers 
as agricultural and rural entrepreneurs. In terms of 
curriculum, this approach emphasizes the importance of 
entrepreneurial skills, including practical experience in 
planning and operating a productive enterprise. Business 
administration, accounting, finance, management, and 
communication skills are important aspects of the plan of 
study.
    Based on a visit to EARTH University, staff believes that 
establishing similar universities in strategic areas would be 
highly beneficial to global food production and rural 
development. Elements of the program should be promoted by 
USAID, especially in its work related to agricultural higher 
education in the following areas:
     Encourage faculties of agriculture to consider 
reviewing the focus of their curricula and educational 
methodologies in order to graduate professionals with the range 
of skills, abilities, and attitudes required to stimulate the 
agricultural and rural economy. While there is clearly a need 
to produce a new generation of researchers, teachers, and 
government employees, many universities in developing countries 
have been unsuccessful in preparing professionals willing and 
capable of leading change in the rural environment. EARTH 
University officials communicated that an emerging consensus in 
the agricultural field points to the need for agricultural 
graduates capable of integrating technical and scientific 
knowledge with practical and applied skills, environmental and 
social awareness, and entrepreneurial preparation and 
leadership skills.
     In addition to promoting transformation of 
existing models for undergraduate education, develop new models 
for technical and diploma level programs aimed at graduating 
community-based practitioners also capable of integrating 
technical and scientific knowledge with practical and applied 
skills, environmental and social awareness, entrepreneurial 
preparation, and leadership skills.
     USAID should also consider the establishment of 
regional hub institutions for entrepreneurship education, which 
could serve to catalyze change in business and entrepreneurship 
education at all levels--from graduate and undergraduate 
university education, to diploma and technical education, and 
including community-based education with farmers and small and 
medium sized producers.
     EARTH University can also serve as a model for 
integrated sustainable farming techniques that are scalable in 
agriculturally challenging topographies and also minimize 
energy and environmental impacts.
    Staff identified universities in food insecure countries 
that have sufficient capacity that they could benefit from 
assistance. Many of these schools existed in countries that 
have demonstrated some commitment to improving higher education 
and investing in agriculture. It was determined that making 
investments in countries without this commitment would most 
likely not have high rates of return. It was not the objective 
of the staff report to catalogue meritorious schools that are 
in need of assistance. The following schools were either 
visited by staff, or were schools on which staff collected 
information, and represent those where some investments in 
foreign assistance could achieve lasting benefits.
     Makerere University, Uganda. Makerere University 
has previously received significant U.S. support. USAID's 
support in the 1980s and 1990s paid off according to current 
Dean of Agriculture at Makerere as the ``best investment ever'' 
in Uganda. Policy has shifted emphasis since then away from the 
public sector, and associations among academia, manpower, and 
research have been unable to maintain their purpose. In a 
country like Uganda, investment in the public sector is 
considered a primary investment of value. Re-establishing U.S. 
support would be a return to an important relationship valued 
by Ugandans.
     University of Philippines Los Banos. The 
Philippines has an unusually high literacy rate for a 
developing country, 93%, and an extensive university system. 
While there are a number of researchers at UP-Los Banos, 
agriculture has fallen out of fashion with students in favor of 
high tech, computers, engineering, etc. There has been a 50% 
decline in enrollment in agriculture courses at UPLB since the 
1980s, and its agriculture economics department will see half 
the senior staff retiring in the near future. Many students 
find it difficult to get work in the field, said the dean, 
Liborio Cabanilla: ``Our agriculture graduates go to work in 
call centers.'' UPLB would be an ideal candidate for 
assistance, with its English-fluent faculty and students, and 
its research infrastructure, which needs upgrading. The 
university does not participate in extension, but university 
officials expressed an interest in strengthening the moribund 
government system.
     Southeast Asian Food and Agricultural Science and 
Technology Center (SEAFAST), Bogor University, Indonesia. The 
center is designed to develop a national and regional system of 
partnerships with governmental, donor, and business sectors in 
the areas of food and agricultural science and technology 
development. It is dedicated to being a regional center 
focusing on improving food quality, nutrition, and food safety 
through science and technology. It is actively seeking mutual 
partnerships and cooperation with national, regional, and 
international institutions. One such partnership has been 
established with Texas A&M University.

    Sound land tenure systems. Staff found that stable land 
tenure systems, defined as having stable land title and 
sufficient farm size to be productive, contribute to food 
security. The very food insecure countries all have unstable 
land tenure and small average farm size. In many countries, 
farmers hold no or unstable title to the land they farm. In 
Uganda, women are unable to own land despite comprising 49% of 
the agricultural labor force. Having unclear land titles means 
that they cannot access credit and have little incentive to 
make investments in their farms.
    Many farmers do not have enough land to produce sufficient 
crops to enter the marketplace. Of the countries studied by 
staff, the average hectare per capita of the rural populations 
ranged from 0.2 in Laos, Ethiopia, and Vietnam, 0.3 in Uganda, 
0.4 in the Philippines, Indonesia, and Guatemala, and 0.7 in 
Zambia. In Africa, 80% of farms are less than 2 hectares.\20\ 
Small plot size is often the result of successive generational 
subdivisions, a trend that shows no sign of abating but 
suggests the need for diversifying the rural economy.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \20\ Paarlberg 2008.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Land reform programs in many countries are more concerned 
with breaking up large and productive farms to redistribute to 
the landless, but with little support in maintaining their 
productive capacity. These programs are focused on political 
objectives rather than farm yield. Zimbabwe is the extreme 
example of land being taken out of production for political 
purposes with catastrophic consequences of agricultural 
productivity. Staff found land reform programs in South Africa, 
the Philippines, and Uganda, and reported problems with their 
implementation and their deleterious effects on productivity. 
One exception was Ethiopia where a land registration program 
has seen some positive results for resolving land disputes, 
creating credit opportunities, enhancing land use, and 
improving gender equality.

    Respect for Market Forces. Staff found that free market 
policies--those that try to work with market forces--are more 
conducive to agricultural development. The most food insecure 
countries suffer from government policies that are not market-
friendly and that interfere in the workings of local and 
national economies.
    Creating a conducive business environment calls for 
policies that incentivize greater investments on the part of 
private sector business and the leveraging of those resources 
to promote equitable growth. Business will make investments 
where there are public policy commitments to improve 
infrastructure, build markets, and provide for transparent and 
fair regulations of business activities. At the other extreme, 
governments that choose to rely entirely on market forces, 
rather than public investments, risk development patterns that 
are not equitable for large segments of the population and not 
reflective of societal needs or objectives.
    Government policies that seek to create markets rather than 
distort them provide more benefits to farmers and consumers. 
Staff found that most fertilizer support programs were being 
used for political purposes and were often inaccessible to 
those most in need. These programs had severe negative effects 
on the private fertilizer market, and where they did reach 
needy farmers, they were not accompanied by extension services. 
In one country visited prior to a presidential election, a 
prominent campaign theme by the incumbent president promised to 
expand the fertilizer program to various segments of the 
population, such as the military and civil servants. Of equal 
concern is that such programs are prone to corruption in both 
design and implementation, which further undermines markets. 
Moreover, budget resources for subsidies take away funds from 
rural development.

                      Justification of Approaches

    Based on these findings, staff made recommendations on 
development approaches with the potential to have the greatest 
impact on alleviating hunger.

    Focus on Small Holders. There are a number of reasons why 
there should be special focus on small holders. First, they 
comprise the majority of the poor and hungry. Seventy-five 
percent of people in developing countries live in rural areas, 
and about half are small holder farmers. Africa's small farmers 
comprise about 80% of the extremely poor.
    Second, they are largely cut off from the local economy 
because they are not producing a surplus for the market. 
Raising their productivity can have a powerful multiplier 
effect as they are able to enter the market, not just as 
producers, but also as consumers. Both roles will spur 
increased economic activity.
    Third, investments to assist small and medium land holders, 
such as improved seed and fertilizer, and better farming 
techniques can have very large and immediate returns.
    Fourth, improving the productivity and incomes of the 
extreme poor will reduce the need for food aid, as they become 
self-sufficient in food production. The emphasis on small 
holders holds special promise for countries with large segments 
of their populations depending on farming for a living.
    A focus on small holders should not signal that commercial 
farming can be neglected. Rather, the eventual development of 
more widespread commercial-scale farming is a goal. Many 
medium-sized farmers have the potential to become commercial in 
scope and produce for a national or international market. For 
net food importing countries, raising productivity through a 
larger and more diverse commercial sector is a reasonable 
approach. The commercial sector also benefits small holders and 
rural landless. The latter depend on these larger operations 
for jobs, and small holder farmers are often able to both sell 
to, and buy from, commercial farms.

    Embrace Technological Solutions. The World Bank estimates 
that the average rate of return on investments in agricultural 
research and extension ranges from 35% in Africa to 50% in 
Asia. Their evaluation of 700 research and development projects 
in developing countries showed an average rate of return of 
43%.\21\ Despite the high payoff from such investments, budget 
allocations that would advance technology and its dissemination 
to farmers are anemic. Improved seed, either from traditional 
cross-breeding or from transgenic technology, is not available 
to most of the developing world even though these varieties 
have been shown to significantly improve yield and decrease the 
need for pesticides and water. As Robert Paarlberg notes in his 
book Starved for Science, when industrial countries adopted 
technology, their agricultural sectors saw significant gains in 
productivity and income. Yet, the same has not happened in 
developing countries. The CGIAR research centers are doing 
important research. New efforts, such as the Alliance for a 
Green Revolution in Africa, funded by the Gates Foundation and 
the Rockefeller Foundation, hold great promise. But, the 
development of improved seed and other inputs must be 
accompanied by the means to disseminate information to small 
holders and programs that make improved inputs accessible.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \21\ ``A Window of Opportunity for Poor Farmers: Investing for 
Long-Term Food Supply,'' Development Outreach, World Bank, October 
2008.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    The resistance to genetically modified (GM) technology is 
particularly glaring when considering its history of safety and 
its benefits to farmers. In 2006, only 22 countries were using 
transgenic seeds on about 100 million hectares, equivalent to 
about 8% of all cultivated land. The only GM seed that is 
widely used by small holders has been Bt cotton, which is used 
for insect resistance, mainly by farmers in India and China. 
Its use has been shown to increase incomes and provide 
significant environmental and health benefits from reduced 
pesticide use.\22\ The development of GM varieties that respond 
to the needs and environmental conditions of small holders in 
developing countries could provide a quantum leap in terms of 
income and benefits. This will not happen without public 
support or through public-private partnerships.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \22\ ``Capturing the Benefits of Genetically Modified Organisms for 
the Poor,'' Development Outreach, World Bank, October 2008.

    Empower Individuals rather than Enable Poverty. The 
objective of development projects should be sustainability. 
That is, will the intervention promote and support an activity 
that will be able to thrive on its own if donor support is 
eventually withdrawn? This most often happens when the design 
is to empower individuals and create an incentive structure for 
sustained economic activity. Programs that provide assistance 
without also providing opportunities may be responding to a 
short-term need at the expense of perpetuating long-term 
poverty.
    Staff had the chance to visit dozens of projects supported 
by USAID and managed by a number of private voluntary 
organizations. Several are highlighted here to demonstrate the 
dynamic of empowerment and the possibility of having a powerful 
multiplier effect.
     MRI Seed, PROFIT (PROduction, Finance, and 
Improved Technology) in Monze, Zambia. With USAID support, the 
PROFIT program is working with MRI Seed, a major Zambian seed 
company, to extend its retail operations to rural areas, 
helping to overcome small holders' lack of access to inputs and 
technology. The company hires ``in-community agents,'' who work 
on commission, and trains them in sales and knowledge 
dissemination. The model increases profits for MRI at little 
cost, while increasing the accessibility of seed and 
information to farmers. The model has been adopted by other 
retail firms, with 13 major commercial input companies having 
now trained more than 800 agents, and having generated $1 
million in new sales over 18 months. USAID and PROFIT report a 
50% increase in yield among farmers adopting new input and 
service technologies, a general upgrading of farming practices 
with tens of thousands of hectares now using modern farming 
management practices, and a shift in small holders now viewing 
their agent as the main source of agricultural information, 
demonstrating the emergence of a private sector extension 
service.
     Mercy Corps/Wal-Mart/Fundacion Agil in 
Chimaltenango, Guatemala. USAID partnered with Mercy Corps, 
Wal-Mart, and Fundacion Agil to support development of a small-
scale producer value chain for farmers from the Samajela Taq 
Winaq Group. The group, nearly 40 men and women from six 
families, traditionally grew strawberries, corn, and beans but 
could not directly access markets and had not employed modern 
productive agricultural practices and harvest techniques. The 
consortium worked with the producers to develop the ability to 
produce high value market-oriented vegetable crops and directly 
access both domestic and international markets, including Wal-
Mart. Producers adhere to strict sanitation rules and rigorous 
record keeping. In addition to increased agricultural 
abilities, members of the group are also expanding their 
knowledge base through accounting and business studies to 
improve the group's profitability. The project has not only 
improved the profitability and education of the six families 
involved, but will now serve as a model for similarly situated 
farming groups that have to date lacked direct access to 
markets and the implementation of strict production standards.
     AGEXPORT, Santiago Sacatepequez, Guatemala. Staff 
visited Cuatro Pinos, an agricultural cooperative founded in 
1979. It is a sophisticated operation designed to coordinate 
the growing of fruits and vegetables on small farms which are 
then moved to a central location for processing, packaging, and 
shipping to U.S. and European markets. The cooperative 
distributes productive seeds and fertilizer to small farmers 
and advises them on food safety standards. Staff believes that 
these efforts have been effective in increasing income for 
small farmers while still allowing them to grow some 
traditional corn and beans and providing employment for an 
additional 1,200 people in the processing facility. This value 
chain model appeared to be very successful with ample ability 
to continue growth.
     Productive Safety Net Programs, Ethiopia. When a 
systemic shock occurs--a natural disaster or price inflation--
the extremely poor often cope by selling off their assets. This 
response further decreases their resiliency to future shocks 
and their ability to break out of a poverty trap. Productive 
safety net programs (PSNP) depart from the practice of costly 
and slow emergency food aid delivery and commit donors to 
multi-year targeted community investment. Such safety nets seek 
to help those in most dire need to weather these shocks without 
having to divest assets. The most productive programs require 
certain actions to receive benefits, such as keeping children 
in school or bringing them to clinics on a regular schedule. 
Some also require community work in exchange for support. 
Ethiopia's program, with support from the United States, seems 
to have already reduced the vulnerability of the current 
beneficiaries by strengthening their community assets value. 
Evidence suggests that since its inception in 2005, it has 
improved household security and community assets for its 7.2 
million recipients in some of the country's most food insecure 
regions. Measurable progress has been reported in asset 
protection, adequate food for consumption, and increased 
availability of credit, which has also decreased labor 
migration and increased school attendance. During food price 
inflation in 2008, PSNP demonstrated that it had built 
substantial resiliency among its beneficiaries.

    Raise Incomes. Hunger is strongly correlated with poverty. 
Poverty prevents both rural and urban populations from 
accessing a nutritional diet. Not all rural dwellers will be 
able to farm. This is self-evident given the already small 
plots of land that continue to be sub-divided among 
generations. The rural landless and the urban poor need jobs 
and incomes to escape both poverty and hunger. Promoting growth 
in rural areas is important in this respect. Agriculture-
related industries are sources of jobs and drive the demand for 
locally produced goods and services leading to greater socio-
economic growth. Increased incomes in rural areas stem the flow 
of economic refugees to cities, where they often join the ranks 
of the urban unemployed. This multiplier effect is one of the 
reasons why the World Bank claims that GDP growth originating 
in agriculture is at least twice as effective in reducing 
poverty as GDP growth originating outside of agriculture.\23\ 
Because agriculture is the main source of income for so many 
poor people living in developing countries, activities that 
raise their incomes will have rapid effects on poverty.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \23\ World Bank, World Development Report 2008, Agriculture for 
Development, 2007.

    Support Markets, Reduce Price Volatility, and Increase 
Market Information. Government policies to improve productivity 
should work with market forces rather than distorting markets. 
Market-distorting policies are not sustainable over the long 
run and do not include the incentives necessary to spur 
production and greater economic activity. Countries benefit 
when the market environment is conducive to private investment. 
Factors that contribute to such an environment include 
transparency in transactions, a reliable and fair regulatory 
framework, and investments in infrastructure--roads, 
irrigation, markets, to name just a few.
    Making farming profitable while keeping food accessible 
through low prices is a tricky proposition. Volatile price 
fluctuations in necessities like food and fuel introduce 
unpredictability into the already tenuous environment of living 
in or near poverty. Small-scale farmers, who are unable to 
produce a surplus, do not benefit from higher commodity prices, 
but they are hit with increased costs of agricultural inputs 
for such basics as seed and fertilizer. What planning they are 
able to do for the next growing season can be upended by a 
price fluctuation of an input or commodity.
    Nations should pursue price stability \24\ while not 
falling prey to price stabilization policies that do more harm 
than good. The latter approach often involves drastic 
interventions in the economy with price floors, ceilings, or 
subsidies that end up distorting the market and thereby 
disrupting economic growth. Instead, supporting a more robust 
national food production system that produces consistent annual 
yields will help to stabilize supply and prices and makes sense 
if, as most economists argue, steep price increases signal 
supply problems. That stability will help farmers to plan and 
invest in future production. Natural disasters will disrupt 
production, and climate change effects in some areas will 
present challenges. But notably, countries that were not 
dependent on imports of staple crops were better able to 
weather last year's price increases.\25\ That is, national food 
production served as a buffer to price fluctuations.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \24\ C. Peter Timmer and David Dawe in ``Managing Food Price 
Instability in Asia: A Macro Food Security Perspective,'' in Asian 
Economic Journal, Vol 21, No. 1, 2007 urge that food price stability 
become a focus of research and policy.
    \25\ USDA, Economic Research Service: ``Food Security Assessment, 
2007,'' 2008.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Price stability can also be enhanced by improving farmers' 
ability to participate in the market. Small holders have 
inadequate access to information that would help them make 
buying, selling, and investment decisions. Often located far 
from markets, they are disadvantaged compared to those who have 
market information. Programs that have made cell phones 
available to farmers have had major impact on markets. A recent 
study by the Center for Global Development found that once cell 
phones were introduced in Niger, the variance in grain prices 
across markets was narrowed by 20%, and the variance of grain 
prices during a 12-month period narrowed by 12%.\26\ Their 
access to timely information helps them decide where and when 
to sell their product and purchase inputs with beneficial 
effects on raising incomes and productivity and providing some 
semblance of price stability.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \26\ Center for Global Development, CGD Notes: `` `Can You Hear Me 
Now?' How Cell Phones are Transforming Markets in Sub-Saharan Africa,'' 
Jenny C. Aker, October 2008.

    Integrate Nutrition into Food Security Programs. As food 
prices increase or food becomes less available, the poor must 
cut back on consumption, or cut out sources of important 
nutrients such as protein. The FAO reports that diets in low-
income countries comprise mostly cereals, roots, and tubers, 
but minimal amounts of meat and dairy products, oil and fats, 
and fruits and vegetables. A diverse and nutritional diet is 
largely unaffordable to the poor. Even in countries with 
moderate food insecurity, staff found alarming rates of 
malnutrition due largely to dietary reliance on a limited range 
of staple foods. Rice can comprise about half of daily diets in 
Asia.
    The issue of child nutrition is particularly compelling as 
evidence shows that sustained lack of nutrition can have 
lifelong consequences for productivity and quality of life. The 
FAO estimates that just 40% to 50% of children under the age of 
two in Africa have a sufficiently nutritious diet. During the 
first two years of life, children need a sustained and high 
nutrient diet in order to develop physically and 
intellectually. Without such a diet, children can suffer the 
permanent consequences of stunting, cognitive deficiencies, and 
increased vulnerability to disease and mortality. The World 
Bank reports that 42% of children in Laos are stunted despite 
the country's progress in reducing maternal and childhood 
mortality. Indonesia, which has improved its overall hunger 
index, shows a negative trend in child malnourishment, 
increasing from 24% in 2000 to 28% in 2005, according to 
UNICEF. Vietnam, another country that has improved its hunger 
index, still has very high rates of child malnutrition with 
some estimates as high as 4 million children under the age of 
five.\27\ The development of improved crops that are 
nutritionally fortified with beta carotene or omega-3 holds 
great promise in overcoming nutritional deficiencies.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \27\ Counterpart International, ``Vietnam's Investment in 
Agriculture and Higher Education in Agricultural Sciences, Agricultural 
Extension,'' December 9, 2008.

    Achieve Better Donor Coordination in the Field. In many 
developing countries, it is common to have dozens of donor 
agencies and even hundreds of implementers managing programs 
across all sectors. It is also common that very little 
consultation among the main donors takes place with much 
frequency, and rarely is there any semblance of coordination. 
This lack of coordination can have two negative consequences. 
First, programs can actually work at cross purposes, with one 
donor urging policies and designing programs that undermine 
other approaches. Second, donor agencies that follow disparate 
projects and agendas are unable to achieve greater 
efficiencies. Working in coordination can have a greater 
development impact, for example, designing projects 
complementary to a large infrastructure project. In the current 
environment of fiscal pressures, donors should work together to 
optimize their investments.
    Experiences in Zambia demonstrated that with the host 
government's encouragement, donor groups can coordinate their 
activities effectively. The donor community has created sub-
groups by sector to share information on approaches and 
activities. The agriculture group, led by the United States, 
the World Bank, and Sweden's Sida, has developed a set of 
principles for all donor agencies working in agriculture. The 
common principles are to ensure that all programs are working 
under the same rules of engagement. Staff did not find this 
same level of coordination in other countries under study.

    Utilize Conservation Farming Techniques. With predicted 
population growth causing increased food demand, it is certain 
that higher levels of agricultural production will put 
pressures on the environment. Soil degradation, deforestation, 
and depleted water resources will cause farmers to open up new 
land to farming, which will reinforce further environmental 
damage. Conservation farming techniques that are locally 
appropriate must be employed alongside modern technology to 
ensure sustainable productivity increases.
    The use of technology to improve yields without greatly 
increasing land under cultivation will be essential. Improved 
seeds created through modern plant breeding techniques, 
including biotechnology, promise drought resistance, improved 
yields, and efficient use of fertilizer. Where conservation 
farming has been adopted, farmers are seeing increased yields. 
The challenge of disseminating information on conservation 
practices and modern farming technologies to smallholders 
suggests the need, as argued elsewhere in this report, for a 
revitalization of extension services, teaching, and research.

    Integrate Approaches to Help Women in the Design of 
Development Programs. Women bear the burden of food production 
in many parts of the world in addition to their traditional 
roles of running a household and raising children, yet they are 
the most difficult to reach with assistance programs. The 
Chicago Council on Global Affairs reports that women and girls 
provide 80% of farm labor in Africa, and 40% in South Asia. In 
Africa, where the HIV/AIDS pandemic has left many women as 
heads of households, they receive less than 10% of small farm 
credit and own just 1% of the land according to a 2007 World 
Bank study.
    Experience has also shown that when women are the focus, 
development payoffs are greater. A 2000 IFPRI study found that 
when women in Africa were given the same level of training, 
experience, and farm inputs as men, their agricultural yields 
increased by 22%. Other studies have found that women are more 
likely to reinvest their incomes for the benefit of their 
families. Women who have access to education have children who 
enjoy higher levels of nutrition and decreased mortality rates. 
According to a recent Organization on Economic Cooperation and 
Development report, national per capita income increases as 
women are educated.
    Staff found that women in many countries, particularly in 
Africa, are largely responsible for food production. It is 
often the case that the husband has succumbed to AIDS or moved 
to a nearby city in search of income. The wife must try to eke 
out a living off a plot of land that is often too small to 
produce a surplus and for which she has tenuous title. She does 
so while having to tend to a number of children, some of whom 
are orphans of other family members. To reach a market, she or 
her children must walk several miles on dirt paths or poor 
roads. Transporting produce to a market can often take up most 
of the day. It is little wonder that women do not have 
discretionary time to attend meetings with a periodically 
visiting extension agent.
    Because of the many and varied demands made on women's time 
and the potential development benefits that accrue from raising 
their incomes, U.S. development programs and projects should 
integrate a women's focus into their design and implementation.

    Don't Allow Agriculture to Become an Extractive Industry. 
During the data collection process of this study, staff 
encountered reports \28\ of foreign companies and governments 
that were responding to increased food prices by accessing 
large tracts of land in developing countries. In most cases, 
the developed country is wealthy, but does not have a 
sufficient natural resource base to ensure its food security. 
For example, reports surfaced in November that Daewoo Logistics 
of South Korea was negotiating with Madagascar for a 99-year 
lease of an extensive tract of the country's arable land for 
corn production. Persian Gulf states are also making similar 
forays into other African countries. According to the reports, 
the food would be exported home. In such cases, farming may 
come to resemble an extractive industry in which the host 
country sees very little benefits. Extractive industries are 
often vulnerable to corruption if the agreements between 
governments and foreign companies lack transparency.\29\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \28\ ``Daewoo to Cultivate Madagascar Land for Free,'' Financial 
Times, November 19, 2008; ``The Breadbasket of South Korea: 
Madagascar,'' Time.com, November 23, 2008; ``Land Leased to Secure 
Crops for South Korea,'' Financial Times, November 18, 2008; ``World 
News: U.N. Food Chief Warns on Buying Farms,'' Wall Street Journal, 
September 10, 2008; ``Foreigners Snap Up African Farmland,'' The 
Vancouver Sun, November 3, 2008.
    \29\ Senate Foreign Relations Committee minority staff report, 
``The Petroleum and Poverty Paradox: Assessing U.S. and International 
Community Efforts to Fight the Resource Curse,'' October 2008.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    In some reported cases, the developing country is providing 
land for free or at little cost with the hope that the foreign 
operation will make improvements in infrastructure and 
technology transfer. However, there was little indication that 
such provisions were being written into agreements and that 
host countries were relying on hope and good faith. Other 
reports indicated that local workers would not be used; the 
exporter company would bring in its own labor, thereby removing 
employment as a potential benefit to the host country. Further, 
having all commodities exported to the home country does little 
to improve food security in the host country, and depending on 
the type of operation, could have negative environmental 
consequences.
    Foreign direct investment (FDI) has long been a feature of 
international commerce. When managed well, it can provide 
powerful benefits for economic growth. This is as true of the 
agriculture sector as other parts of the economy. In fact, such 
operations could increase global food production thereby 
exerting downward pressure on high prices. However, host 
countries must exhibit great caution in entertaining these 
proposals. Negotiated agreements should provide benefits to 
both parties. They should ensure that operations are 
environmentally sound and do not result in massive 
deforestation. They must ensure transparency so that benefits 
accrue to the society at large and not just to the elite.

                      Regional and Country Reviews

    The following discussion categorizes countries by the level 
of their food security, from countries that are considered 
chronically insecure and regularly require international food 
aid to those that are net exporters of food and have relatively 
small proportions of their populations that are considered 
hungry. A third category represents those with moderate to 
serious food insecurity and those that have witnessed a change 
in their condition over the past two decades.

                         SEVERE FOOD INSECURITY

    Those countries that find themselves unable to feed their 
people generally are low-income countries that have not had the 
resources to invest in agriculture. Infrastructure and 
education systems are poor, and government policy has not 
helped to establish an environment conducive to agriculture or 
private sector development. Extension and research services are 
poor or non-functioning. Ironically, having a good natural 
resource base does not guarantee food security if farmers are 
unable to exploit it. Histories of civil conflict prevent 
farmers from producing and are exacerbated by periodic natural 
disasters such as droughts and flooding. Of the countries 
studied by staff, three fall into the category of food insecure 
with significant portions of their populations suffering from 
chronic hunger: Ethiopia, Zambia, and Laos.

Ethiopia

    The food security status of Ethiopia could be characterized 
as chronically food insecure with unpredictable but regular 
crises. Generalized poverty across Ethiopia ranks this country 
as low as 8th poorest in the world. Despite significant 
resources, 80% of Ethiopians, some 61.6 million people, exist 
on less than $2 dollars a day. Food insecurity is especially 
critical in rural areas where 86% of the population resides. 
Economic insecurity dominates the urban centers where 
unemployment, inflation, and a lack of social safety nets put 
residents at risk. HIV/AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis, and a lack 
of clean water are constant threats to life.
    Due to its chronic conditions, Ethiopia has been the 
subject of multiple studies of the agriculture sector and food 
security of its population. One such study, the 2004 USAID 
report entitled Breaking the Cycle of Food Crises: Famine 
Prevention in Ethiopia, stated that Ethiopia's economic 
conditions are not primarily the result of drought but rather 
``the weak economic policies of the country over a sustained 
period--characterized by low rates of investment in economic 
growth and agriculture by both government and the commercial 
private sector.''
    The dominant national source of income is coffee exports. 
Additional efforts to secure niche commercial crops, such as 
flowers (roses) have been successful due to a free-trade 
environment surrounding the investment and trade of this 
product. The agricultural sector in Ethiopia accounts for 85% 
of total employment, 46% of GDP, and 92% of total export 
earnings. The vast majority of employment is on small-holder 
subsistence farms that generate insufficient income to feed a 
family.
    According to a report by Save the Children, the current 
food crisis has been brought about, in large part, by rising 
food prices--Ethiopia's food consumer price index was 91.7% 
higher in July 2008 compared to July 2007. In some parts of 
Ethiopia, maize prices have increased 266% since 2005 with a 
177% increase from February to April 2008. Neighboring Kenya 
saw prices rise by only 44%.
    Ethiopia is chronically food insecure primarily because of 
poor government policy and extremely limited capacity. The 2008 
Global Hunger Index ranks Ethiopia near the bottom of the scale 
at 31, significantly worse than most other countries in sub-
Saharan Africa. Because the 2008 food crisis was not reflected 
in this ranking, Ethiopia's food situation is likely worse than 
its score indicates. Nearly 10 million people of a population 
of 77 million are at risk of starvation every year. In 2005 
(the latest national measure) 46% of the population were 
considered malnourished (down from 63% in 1995). Malnutrition 
is a chronic problem with more than half of children under five 
years stunted, while 47% are underweight (UNICEF, 2004). The 
minimum caloric intake cost is more than the income of nearly 
50% of Ethiopians.
    A critical policy deficit is land tenure/land use policy, 
which currently precludes any ownership while maintaining 
unverifiable and undocumented leasing arrangements. There are a 
host of specific additional causes of food insecurity that 
result from the policy and incapacity, including: the lack of 
national, regional, or local infrastructure--from roads to 
electrification to storage and transfer, to education and 
training. There are also obvious proximate environmental or 
climatic impediments to improved agricultural outputs and 
nourishment of the population in many regions of the country, 
primarily recurrent and more frequent drought conditions as 
well as untimely and unpredictable rainfall, deforestation, and 
land degradation. The lack of attention to infrastructure and 
meager resources devoted to the sector have resulted in an 
over-tasked and overcrowded university system and limited 
development of effective agriculture research centers, 
extension services, and even competent seed multiplication 
facilities. Compounding these factors is an ongoing turbulence 
in the political realm with internal conflict across the 
political spectrum, and persistent, perceived external threats 
from north, west, and south that absorb inordinate human and 
economic resources.
    Additional critical elements of the Ethiopian situation 
include dramatic land and soil degradation; pastoralist 
livelihood challenges due to land policy, climatic conditions, 
and conflict; an under-resourced and underutilized livestock 
industry that leads the continent in size despite poor 
infrastructure and support; a significant unrealized dairy 
potential; and an unexploited fertilizer industry. Finance for 
rural enterprise, especially agriculture, is hampered by 
limited resources and high risk due to climatic conditions and 
poor agriculture inputs. Subsistence farmers and wage labor 
households depend on self-finance and community-based/
cooperative resources. This population has limited if any 
collateral due to ill-defined property and land use rights. 
Faced with high cost inputs and uncertainty over the harvest, 
most farmers opt for low-cost inputs that produce lower yields.
    Ethiopia is not food insecure because it is short of 
natural resources but because of a common array of persistent 
human inhibitors compounding natural challenges. Pro-
agricultural development and rural growth rhetoric abound but 
are insufficient to reverse the negative impact of bad policy 
and the lack of political will by the government to 
fundamentally restructure problematic economic development 
plans.
    Ethiopia and its nearly 80 million people are confronted 
with profound risk and the donor community is itself confronted 
with a profound dilemma--aid or strong medicine? Should chronic 
Ethiopian under-development be addressed by transformative 
policy or should the status quo of the last 30 years be 
sustained by continued alignment of humanitarian and 
development assistance with ad hoc incrementalism preferred by 
the regime?
    There is substantial agreement that the existing 
landholding system is the prime obstacle to effective 
agricultural sector development and thus Ethiopia's economic 
growth. Granted there are many visible deficiencies in one of 
the poorest countries on earth, beginning with a dearth of 
financial resources for infrastructure, education, science, 
extension services, markets, and so on. But, the landholding 
rules, norms, and associated policy are so uncertain for the 
farmer, the trader, the banker, the marketer, the exporter, or 
even the government, that credit is a rare and risky venture 
that stands between chronic hunger and any growth. A recently 
completed pilot project sponsored by USAID--ELTAP--has shown 
that credible land registration can and does dramatically 
improve farmer and agriculture sector opportunities for growth. 
Despite such promise the program, like many before it, is 
struggling for national and donor resources to continue while 
also at risk of political ambivalence given other perceived 
priorities.
    The confluence of chronic factors noted above, compounded 
by the global food crisis and mounting internal political and 
external tensions, suggests that sustaining current development 
approaches will only prolong the inevitable and growing 
humanitarian catastrophe. Broadening poverty, competition for 
resources among the growing population, and chronic food 
insecurity due to erratic natural and man-made influences 
portend a troubling outcome. Ethiopian history has shown that 
policies that do not adequately address the most basic needs of 
the people will eventually lead to a new government much as it 
did under the Emperor and Marxist Dergue regimes. Donor country 
humanitarian and development response has been consistent in 
meeting most of Ethiopia's hunger through massive food aid, 
even in good harvest years, however it has been at the expense 
of broad, coherent development based on effective principles 
such as land use policy that recognizes and releases the value 
of land. Donors in Ethiopia accept this as the price for 
working there; as they have accepted the government's 
insistence, on pain of expulsion, that cholera, which is quite 
common in Ethiopia, not be called by its name but by the 
euphemism Acute Watery Diarrhea (AWD) in order to avoid 
embarrassment.
    On the other hand, the government of Ethiopia could seize 
the initiative of this looming catastrophe and join its many 
international donors as partners in a broad review of policy 
from which to establish a fundamentally new national approach 
to achieve agricultural sector and general economic 
development. The principles have been well studied, both in 
Ethiopia and in much of the developing world. Though not all 
lessons are relevant, such principles could transform long-term 
development policy that would allow Ethiopians to realize the 
vast potential of existing natural resources that could set 
their country on a path to broad economic growth and food 
security. There are reasons for setbacks but there is no 
rationale for failure to capitalize on available resources and 
means. Recommendations for specific actions include: reforms to 
ensure the security of land tenure; a dual approach of 
strengthening both small-scale and commercial farmers; address 
regulatory and tax environments for agriculture; improve 
infrastructure, including roads, irrigation, storage, and 
markets; strengthen research and extension services; and build 
national fertilizer production.

Zambia

    When considering Zambia's natural resource base, there is 
no reason why the country should be food insecure. It has ample 
arable land and a relatively small population. Roughly 40% of 
southern Africa's water resources flow through its territory. 
Yet, large areas of Zambia are chronically food insecure. 
Zambia has the potential to produce food surpluses, but it is 
hampered by: poor infrastructure; inadequate and/or expensive 
inputs; poor access to markets; lack of crop and livelihood 
diversification; poor research and extension services; 
government policies that distort the market; inadequate 
investments in agriculture by the Zambian government and 
international donors; and, a distrust of both science and free 
markets. An increase in droughts and flooding can tip the scale 
from moderate levels of food insecurity to a more severe 
situation requiring international food aid.
    Zambia is a lower income country of approximately 12 
million people with one of the world's highest adult HIV/AIDS 
prevalence rates (17%). The country is the most urbanized in 
Sub-Saharan Africa, with 40%-50% living in cities and towns. 
About 80% of the rural population and 34% of the urban 
population live in poverty. Historically, copper mining has 
been the driving force of economic development, which has 
contributed to the high urbanization rate. When copper prices 
are high, government policies focus on the mining sector and 
agriculture is short-changed. However, 80% of the population is 
dependent on agriculture, which provides 70% of the labor 
force, and comprises 22% of GDP, according to the FAO.
    According to IFPRI's 2008 Global Hunger Index, Zambia 
scores 29.2--hungrier than Sub-Sahara Africa's average of 23. 
This score represents a significant number of undernourished 
people: 46% of the population during 2002 to 2004. The under-
five mortality rate is 18%, with 23% of children under five 
underweight. Zambia shows no progress from its score of 29.1 in 
1990. Hunger in Zambia is due to both food deficits and high 
poverty rates that prevent the poor from having access to food, 
or to a diversified diet.
    According to various sources, at least 10% of Zambian 
households have no productive assets or income. Many of these 
are female-headed households affected by the AIDS epidemic. It 
is estimated that at least 445,000 people will need food aid 
prior to the March 2009 harvest. With a high poverty rate, 
especially in rural areas where most households are small-scale 
farmers, many more are vulnerable to low productivity and 
disruptions in output from flooding and droughts.
    An estimated 600,000 small holders farm between \1/2\ 
hectare and 20 hectares of land; about 100,000 medium-scale 
holders farm between 20 and 60 hectares; and some 1500 
commercial enterprises farm more than 60 hectares. Michigan 
State University (MSU) estimates that the mean farm size is 
3.27 hectares. While the commercial sector is considered 
productive, small and medium holders produce significantly less 
per hectare even though these households produce the majority 
of the country's staple crop of maize. Small holders suffer 
from a lack of access to inputs, such as fertilizer, seed, and 
irrigation systems. They often employ farming techniques that 
are ill-suited to their soil type or climatic conditions. A 
lack of secondary and tertiary roads makes it difficult to 
fully participate in farm markets. The World Food Program 
reported that while higher income Zambian families spend about 
40% of their incomes on food, the poor can spend up to 80%.
    The high HIV/AIDS prevalence rate of 17% contributes to 
food insecurity because of its impact in rural areas. There are 
reportedly about one million orphans \30\ in Zambia, often 
living in households that have no breadwinner. Women are 
particularly burdened with caring for children and trying to 
eke out a living. Women farmers access extension services far 
less than men, largely because of their lack of discretionary 
time. A recent MSU study found that female-headed households 
have between 0.7 and 0.5 less hectares than male-headed 
households.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \30\ According to UNICEF, there were a total of 1.2 million orphans 
in Zambia in 2005, of which 710,000 resulted from HIV/AIDS deaths. 
UNAIDS reports about 600,000 orphans are due to HIV/AIDS in 2008.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Extension services are government run and are considered 
ineffective. Extension agents are not fully engaged in the 
field, and agriculture school graduates prefer other lines of 
work. The university system does not emphasize extension 
services. The NGO community is providing these types of 
services in projects that advocate conservation farming and 
other techniques, but this does little to strengthen extension 
services in general, and may in fact be diverting extension 
agents to their employ. It was generally conceded that NGOs pay 
better than government positions. An innovative USAID-supported 
program works with a private seed company to serve small 
holders by using agents to sell their products and to provide 
information on higher yield farming techniques.
    Approximately 94% of land is held in a customary tenure 
system in which land is occupied by some 73 tribes, and land is 
distributed according to the dicta of tribal chiefs, senior 
chiefs, and paramount chiefs. Six percent of land is 
statutorily held by the government. Gaining access to the use 
of tribal land does not seem to be difficult, whether the 
request is from a small holder or relocating commercial farmers 
from Zimbabwe. However, the lack of real title may hinder 
improvements necessary for transitioning from subsistence to 
commercial output, or to the access of financing for those 
improvements.
    Zambia is food insecure not because of its natural resource 
base or climatic conditions--even though it has been hit with 
recent droughts and floods in some regions--but because of a 
lack of investment in agriculture productivity and 
infrastructure, and because of policies that distort the 
market. All of these conditions are fixable, and Zambia could 
become a major exporter and food source for southern Africa.

Laos

    The Lao People's Democratic Republic, as it is formally 
known, is a poor, landlocked, mountainous, sparsely populated 
(pop: six million), agricultural Communist country that, 
perhaps surprisingly, is self-sufficient in rice and most other 
foods. The least advanced of the three countries that once made 
up French Indochina, the average per capita income is about $2 
a day. Ethnic Lao, Buddhists who make up about half the 
population, live mostly in the lowland areas and dominate 
culture and politics. They fare better than minority groups, 
including Hmong and others, who live in tribal villages in the 
mountains under primitive conditions, many still practicing 
slash-and-burn agriculture (called in development circles 
shifting cultivation or swidden agriculture). The number of 
ethnic groups ranges, depending on who is counting, from 49 to 
200. Hydroelectric power exported from dams on tributaries to 
the Mekong River, tourism (especially to the old royal capital 
Luang Prabang, an unspoiled gem), and mining are major sources 
of foreign exchange. There is little manufacturing or other 
industry: agriculture, dominated by subsistence rice farming, 
accounts for 41% of the economy and 78% of the workforce.
    Laos scores 20.6 on the Global Health Index, virtually the 
same as Sudan (20.5). In the World Development Report, it is 
classified as an ``agriculture-based'' country along with much 
of sub-Saharan Africa, rather than ``transforming'' like most 
other East Asian countries. According to a WFP assessment in 
2006, ``Every second child below 5 years in the rural areas is 
chronically malnourished [and is stunted as a result]. This is 
alarmingly high and remains as high as it was ten years ago,'' 
despite steady growth in the economy and agricultural output 
over that period. ``Two-thirds of the rural households have a 
livelihood portfolio that puts them at risk of becoming food 
insecure.'' The food insecure tend to be unskilled laborers or 
farmers who seldom fish and hunt. They are poor, isolated, 
illiterate minorities who suffer from bad sanitary conditions. 
Thus, though Laos is self-sufficient in rice production overall 
(a few deficits persist in some areas, especially the north), 
and the government says rice production has increased 75% since 
the introduction of Chinese-style market economic reforms in 
1986, food security in Laos is better viewed through the prism 
of nutrition than through agricultural production.
    Aside from asset wealth (the well-off are more secure than 
the poor), occupation seems to be an important determinant: 
non-farmers who engage in petty trading, skilled labor, or 
salaried jobs do best. Farmers and unskilled workers do worst. 
Farmers who supplement their crops with fishing and hunting 
often fare better, because lack of fat, oils, and 
micronutrients is a major cause of malnutrition, according to 
the WFP. Sanitation and health care are also important for the 
many people who live in minority villages that may be a day's 
walk or more from a road, and from there another day's journey 
to a town with a clinic. The government has tried to cluster 
villages near roads in order to deliver services and provide 
market access, with mixed success. Many upland residents rely 
heavily on so-called non-timber forest products (NTFP) to 
supplement their diet (eg., mushrooms, ferns, game) and their 
incomes (rattan, agarwood). However, overpopulation, access 
restrictions to protect watershed, mining, and commercial 
clearing for rubber plantations are limiting these traditional 
resources. The WFP study also found that a successful 
government anti-opium drive had cut the income from many 
farmers who grew the crop, and that tons of unexploded ordnance 
(UXO) left over from the Indochina War renders much potential 
farm and forage land inaccessible. In addition, malnutrition is 
affected by ignorance of good nutrition practices by upland 
dwellers, and by some traditional practices followed by nursing 
mothers.
    Lowland farmers have small plots (1.8 hectares) in 
traditional rice paddy areas, while the upland minorities rely 
on less productive upland or dry rice production from similarly 
sized plots (1.4). Likewise, a majority of lowland farmers have 
effective title to their land, but few of the mountain people 
do. An Asian Development Bank (ADB) study says ``access to rice 
is the single most important factor'' for the welfare of rural 
Laotians, and that the most severe deficiencies occur in the 
mountainous northern and eastern regions.
    According to the WFP, only 4% of total land area is 
cultivated. Rice covers more than 80% of the farmed area, and 
nearly all of it (90%) is rainfed. The government \31\ says the 
current 100,000 hectares of irrigated land could be expanded to 
up to 300,000, but it is too costly. Upland rice (grown in dry 
fields, not in flooded paddies) accounts for 15% of total rice 
area. Irrigated fields account for about 14% of total 
production, and have the highest yield, 4.4 tons per hectare, 
compared to 3.4 tons for rainfed lowland rice and 1.8 tons for 
upland rice. The government is trying to end the practice of 
shifting agriculture in the mountains (bans began in the 1980s, 
but a target of total elimination by 2000 was not met; new 
targets are in place), and total land area used for shifting 
cultivation dropped from 119,000 hectares in 2001 to 29,400 
hectares in 2005. An Asian Development Bank survey of 95 
villages in the poorest districts found that resettlement 
programs connected with anti-swidden efforts often led to lower 
rice production and population pressure on scarce resources.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \31\ Staff was told by respected international organizations active 
in Laos that all agricultural data must be considered provisional 
because no reliable agricultural census had been conducted in many 
years. One is now underway.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Another unusual problem for Laos is the vast amount of 
unexploded ordnance that limits access to land. In part because 
the Ho Chi Minh trail ran along eastern Laos, an estimated two 
million tons of bombs were dropped on the country. Many of 
these were `cluster munitions,' and an estimated 30% of the 
bomblets failed to explode. This renders much of the land in 
Laos dangerous or impossible for farming or foraging. There is 
so much metal that a cottage industry in scrap collection has 
arisen, and there are at least 16 registered smelters that turn 
the metal into construction re-bars. The metal collection 
process contributes to a persistently high casualty rate. The 
UN says UXO in Laos still claims about 300 casualties a year. 
UXO clearance is expensive ($2,000-$3,000 per hectare) and very 
time-consuming. Construction companies that want to build a dam 
pay private firms millions to clear the area. Figures on how 
much arable or forest land is off limits as a result were hard 
to pin down, but many of those interviewed said it was a 
significant amount. A World Bank report mentions in passing 
that UXO is one of the major causes of poverty ``still 
affecting half the country's territory.''
    The most food insecure people in Laos are the remote hill 
people who live lifestyles not far removed from hunter-gatherer 
societies of the 19th century. The second most vulnerable are 
the many subsistence farmers who do not have enough cash to buy 
the extra food they need. But for all vulnerable groups, the 
quality of the diet, and other food habits, contribute at least 
as much as food quantity to their poor nutrition. Rural 
Laotians are not in the habit of eating meat, and their diet is 
very low in vegetable fats and oils. Many rely on wild fish for 
their protein. Lack of micronutrients is a problem. Breast-
feeding/weaning practices and food taboos for nursing mothers 
are also a concern: many women believe they should not eat 
after giving birth--sometime for as long as three months. Pre-
natal and maternal care is also virtually non-existent for hill 
people: staff was told of a big need for de-worming of mothers 
and infants. Simply increasing consumption will not be enough 
to solve the malnutrition problem. By the same token, much can 
be done to reduce malnutrition rates regardless of the food 
supply.
    What is needed, according to the consensus of those 
interviewed, is a comprehensive nutrition strategy that would 
cover health care and counseling, nutrition education to effect 
long-term changes in eating habits and food choices, food 
supplements, crop diversification into more nutritive food like 
peanuts (for oil) and ``kitchen garden'' vegetables, rural 
development, and better rural livelihoods through access to 
markets. Improving crop productivity through better varieties, 
more inputs, and better technology to close what one expert 
called ``a big productivity gap'' would be complementary. The 
problem is that until now the Lao government's capacity to 
carry out such a strategy is negligible. ``Most of the staff in 
health care have very little training, and there is no training 
in nutrition,'' said one international expert. Getting the 
proper interventions out to dispersed and remote mountain 
villages would be a challenge even for a government far more 
competent than that of Laos.
    The government of Laos, prodded by the WFP's alarming 
malnutrition revelations, on Dec. 1, 2008, issued a National 
Nutrition Policy 2008-2020, prepared in consultation with the 
FAO and others, and is now developing a strategy and action 
plan to implement it. The U.S. could support elements of the 
plan, the first ever by the Lao government to combat high 
malnutrition rates, either with specific programs and inputs, 
or simply by improving government capacity through training of 
nurses, nutrition counselors, etc. The U.S. could also invest 
directly in agriculture and food distribution, either through 
specific projects on plant and livestock breeding, irrigation 
and fertilizer, pest and disease control, rural development, 
training and deployment of extension agents, etc., or by 
increasing the government's capacity to do so. The World Bank 
and other donors often seek to improve capacity through budget 
support, which is not U.S. policy; the U.S. could do it in 
other ways to signal approval of the Lao government's important 
decision to make nutrition a keystone of its development 
policies.

                              FOOD SECURE

    Several characteristics distinguish food secure countries. 
They have a long history of investing in the agricultural 
sector and have sound extension services. They have solid 
education systems and good research facilities. Perhaps most 
significantly, they have been able to join the ranks of middle-
income countries. Even so, some can also have significant 
portions of their populations that are insecure. Of the 
countries visited by staff, both South Africa and Costa Rica 
have achieved impressive hunger index scores on a par with 
other major food producing countries. Both have democratic 
governments with active civil society.

South Africa

    South Africa is an upper middle income country with highly 
developed infrastructure, trade relations, university system, 
and research facilities. Its market economy is based on 
services, manufacturing, and mining; agriculture comprises just 
8% of the workforce and contributes 3.8% to GDP. Despite having 
first-world characteristics, nearly half of its 49 million 
citizens live in conditions more common in developing 
countries. Of these nearly 25 million people, \3/4\ of 
households lack access to electricity and running water. Half 
do not receive a primary school education, and more than a 
third of children suffer from chronic malnutrition, according 
to the World Bank.
    According to IFPRI's 2008 Global Hunger Index, South Africa 
scores an impressive 6.9, much better than the Sub-Saharan 
African average of 23 points (with some individual countries 
topping 40). The score reflects the impact of the first-world 
half of South Africa's dual nature. The country is considered 
food secure even with significant portions of the population 
suffering from hunger and malnutrition. It obtains its food 
secure status because it does not have a food deficit, 
producing a surplus and exporting food products to the African 
continent and Europe. This is largely due to the legacy of a 
robust commercial farming sector, from which few black South 
Africans benefitted--particularly during the apartheid regime.
    Rising food prices are considered one of the primary 
drivers of South Africa's rising inflation rate. The country is 
experiencing the highest food inflation rate in five years--
from July 2007 to July 2008 the increase in the Consumer Price 
Index for Food was 17.8%.
    According to the South Africa Department of Agriculture, at 
least 2 million households (or approximately 12 million people) 
are vulnerable and the number may be higher as a result of the 
food price spikes that occurred in late 2007 and 2008. Other 
reliable sources in the country estimate that half the 
country's population is food insecure. In a 2005 report, the 
FAO estimated that 14 million, or one-third of the total 
population, is vulnerable to food shortages. Most of the hungry 
live in rural areas, although urban poverty has been a 
persistent problem. The rural hungry are generally small land 
holders (approximately 3 million subsistence farmers, according 
to the Department of Agriculture) with insufficient land and 
little access to capital, technology, and agriculture inputs 
necessary to raise farm yield. It is estimated that, on 
average, poor South Africans spend more than 30% of their 
incomes on food, according to the South African National 
Agricultural Marketing Council. With a high HIV/AIDS prevalence 
rate ranging between 16% and 18%, women become head of 
households, often caring for a number of orphaned children. In 
good times, women carry a heavy burden; in bad times, women and 
their dependents can be pushed from poor but resilient into 
extreme poverty.
    Despite not having huge tracts of highly arable land and 
ample water resources, South Africa produces a food surplus 
that allows it to both export and donate food. There are many 
factors that have contributed to this situation. An investment 
in commercial farming combined with the adoption of technology 
to overcome productivity issues, strong infrastructure, robust 
research and extension, and fully developed markets demonstrate 
that deficits in a natural resource base can be overcome 
through knowledge transfer, scientific research, and government 
policies that do not distort market forces.
    The South African government has shown a commitment to 
development in general--building 3 million houses, and 
increasing water and electricity coverage to 80% of the 
country, with the size of the black middle class tripling. The 
FAO attributes food insecurity to the level of poverty in the 
country and the lack of infrastructure in deep rural areas. 
Those who suffer from food insecurity are at risk because they 
lack income to access food.

Costa Rica

    Costa Rica is a middle-income country with a strong 
democratic history. Compared with its Central American 
neighbors, Costa Rica has achieved a high standard of living 
and has not yet faced serious food security problems.
    The percentage of undernourished Costa Ricans was 
approximately 5% in 2002-2004, compared to 19% for all of 
Central America, according to FAO data. Costa Rica has seen a 
steady decrease in the percentage of undernourished people from 
8% in 1980 to its current level of approximately 5%.
    Costa Rica imports all its wheat, yellow corn, and 
soybeans, primarily from the United States. Imports of rice and 
beans, two important staples in the diet of the Costa Rican 
population, have increased over time, as local production has 
declined. However, Costa Rica is an exporter of a wide variety 
of food products, including fresh fruits, coffee, sugar, beef, 
and dairy products.
    The agricultural sector is a mixture of large commercial 
farming operations (bananas and pineapples, for instance, where 
large multinational companies play a leading role) and a robust 
small-scale farming sector (the coffee and dairy sectors, for 
example, are made up of thousands of small producers). Small-
scale farmers in different sectors are able to benefit from 
domestic and international trade. There are several 
organizations established by law that regulate the relationship 
between the producers, processors, and exporters. Instituto del 
Cafe de Costa Rica (ICAFE) in the coffee sector, Liga Agricola 
Industrial de la Cana de Azucar (LAICA) in sugar, Corporacion 
Arrocera Nacional (CONARROZ) in rice, Corporacion Bananera 
Nacional (CORBANA) in bananas, are examples of those 
organizations which, according to producers, are beneficial to 
the various sectors involved.
    The government is promoting commercial liberalization and 
food security at the same time. It has been working on the 
process of commercial openness for 20 years. At the same time, 
starting this year, the government has the National Plan for 
Food Production encompassing a number of investments in the 
sector. Commercial liberalization and food security are not 
regarded as opposing goals.
    Costa Rica has the largest volume of investment in science 
and technology compared with the rest of Central America. 
However, the amount of money invested as a percentage of GDP is 
still low. Moreover, most of the research is not integrated 
into a coordinated plan with an underlying strategic vision. It 
is scattered in a number of institutions without coordination. 
GM crops are not explicitly prohibited but the matter is still 
being debated. Officials from the Ministry of Agriculture told 
staff that they personally supported biotechnology, but many in 
the government oppose their position.
    For a couple of years now the agricultural extension 
service has been using an agro-alimentary food chain approach. 
It is organized from a national directorate at the Ministry of 
Agriculture with a network of regional offices and extension 
services for free to small and medium-size agricultural 
producers. Compared with the rest of Central America, Costa 
Rica is the country with the most public resources allocated to 
agricultural extension programs.
    The government's development plans are not biased 
necessarily toward urban or rural areas. The Government has 
strong, traditional ties to agriculture and celebrates farming 
as symbolic of Costa Rican provincial life. Just as Costa Rica 
is interested in maintaining rice production through government 
support and promotes agricultural exports, it also promotes 
free trade zones for business growth in professional services, 
added value industrial production (from car parts to 
microchips), and medical supplies. This type of commercial 
activity tends to be located in urbanized San Jose. Thus, Costa 
Rican economic policy addresses both urban and rural areas.
    Costa Rica did not impose restrictions on the import or 
export of food at the height of the food crisis in mid-2008. 
Although domestic food security concerns are gaining strength, 
most recommendations focus on increasing domestic production 
and productivity. A National Food Plan, proposed by the 
government on May 7, 2008, aims to increase local grains 
production and provide direct cash transfers to the most 
vulnerable members of Costa Rican society. There have been 
virtually no calls for export restrictions as a means of 
dealing with rising food prices. The Minister of Agriculture 
expressed strong support for imports to meet Costa Rica's food 
security needs, although he plans to promote efforts to 
increase local production of rice and beans.
    In order to protect local producers, Costa Rica does 
maintain long-standing import restrictions (in the form of 
higher import tariffs) on meats, rice, potatoes, and onions. 
Tariff restrictions on meats will be eliminated for the most 
part upon CAFTA's entry into force, although some tariffs will 
be eliminated gradually. Until the recent world food price 
crisis, the Costa Rican rice sector was generally assumed to be 
a candidate for downsizing; now the Costa Rican government is 
actively looking for ways to stimulate the sector and ensure 
its survival under more open market conditions.
    Although farmers usually complain about the lack of 
adequate infrastructure, especially in the rural areas, the 
existing infrastructure has allowed the country to become a 
diversified agricultural products exporter. Fresh produce and 
other basic foodstuffs are available year round throughout the 
country. Farmers markets operate in most of the larger towns of 
the country.
    Costa Rica farms roughly 10% of its land area. The Country 
has made an effort to increase irrigation available to farmers 
primarily in the province of Guanacaste, a particularly dry 
area during the dry season, which extends from December to May, 
and sometimes into June or July in this area of the country. 
Many producers now enjoy the ability to plant crops during the 
dry season in this region as a result of the irrigation 
projects. The rest of the country is not as affected by reduced 
water availability during the dry season. However, as the 
population grows, especially in the central valley and in the 
coastal regions, water scarcity and pollution are becoming very 
important issues. The government of Costa Rica is increasingly 
concerned about increased competition for water resources 
between urban users and the agricultural sector.
    Costa Rica and other parts of the Central America and the 
Caribbean region could see a change in rainfall patterns and 
growing seasons arising from climate change. For example, 
researchers from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric 
Administration (NOAA) and the University of Massachusetts 
Amherst Climate System Research Center estimate that many areas 
of Costa Rica will become warmer and drier as a result of 
climate change, particularly in high elevation Pacific slopes 
and the Caribbean lowlands. Elsewhere in the Caribbean region, 
the Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre (CCCCC) estimates 
that a 2+ Centigrade rise in temperature would result in a 10-
14% reduction in the region's yield of rice, a 14-19% drop in 
beans, and up to a 22% drop in maize production.
    Officials of the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation 
on Agriculture (IICA) told staff that they expect to see an 
increase in support subsidies for poor farmers as a response to 
the recent spike in food prices, with the aim of building 
infrastructure and capacity. IICA proposed increased efforts to 
train farmers, give them credit, and improve agricultural 
infrastructure. Likewise, the Minister of Agriculture said that 
the credit crisis is preventing farmers from obtaining small 
loans.
    Farmers can readily obtain seeds, fertilizers, and other 
agricultural inputs in Costa Rica, either locally produced or 
imported, depending on the product. The commercial sector is 
fairly developed and there are different suppliers of 
agricultural inputs throughout the country.
    Adoption of new varieties is fairly rapid in the country 
once a new variety is approved. However, this varies by sector, 
as some sectors are more traditional than others. Also, some 
sectors are primarily export oriented (pineapples for instance) 
and respond faster to international market requirements.

                        MODERATELY FOOD INSECURE

    Within this category are countries that are improving their 
food security status, and those that are stagnating or are 
likely to see degraded food security in the future unless 
interventions are made.
    Improving Countries. Some countries have made great strides 
in the past two decades to improve their food security. IFPRI 
identified ten countries that have improved their hunger index 
since 1990, some by significant measures--Kuwait, Peru, Syria, 
Turkey, Mexico, Egypt, Vietnam, Thailand, Brazil, and Iran. 
Staff confirmed the improvements made by Vietnam, and 
identified Indonesia as also having improved its agricultural 
productivity.

Indonesia

    Indonesia's Global Hunger Index moved from 16 in 1990 to 
11.3 in 2008.\32\ The food security situation in Indonesia is 
volatile with respect to the global increases in agricultural 
commodity prices. Food is largely available to all Indonesians 
throughout the 17000-plus, island archipelaego. Lack of access 
is the main problem contributing to food insecurity in some 
poor areas. Root causes are the lack of productive assets, poor 
natural resources, underdevelopment of the local economy, and a 
fragile environment. Many rural areas throughout the 
archipelago, especially those outside of the Bali-Java region, 
are food insecure largely due to the lack of roads and related 
infrastructure.\33\ Rural communities in eastern Indonesia 
suffer from food insecurity because of a series of challenges 
including chronic drought, limited access to financial capital 
and markets, public policies that discourage production, 
farmers' limited technical skills, and poor storage. In 
addition, farmers are unable to obtain information on farming 
techniques, and households have very limited knowledge of sound 
nutritional practices. Extension services have faltered over 
the years, but strengthening them is a government objective.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \32\ IFPRI 2008 Global Hunger Index.
    \33\ Indonesia Economic Program Assessment (IEPA), 2008.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Indonesia is among those countries where protests over 
higher food prices have erupted. According to the FAO, ``even 
small fluctuations in the price of food can tip the balance 
between poverty and grinding hunger.'' The urban and landless 
poor are affected by price increases. In addition to the urban 
poor, large numbers of rice farmers have small plots that are 
insufficient to produce a surplus. These farmers are net buyers 
of rice. Not only do they not benefit from high rice prices, 
but more of their incomes are consumed in purchasing the 
staple.
    Rice is the main staple for Indonesians and its production 
is a politically sensitive issue. Increases in the price of 
rice have significantly affected about half of the population 
with food taking up about 30% of the household budget. The 
country is still struggling to cope with the aftermath of the 
December 2004 tsunami that killed more than 150,000 people, 
displaced more than half a million people, and destroyed 
schools, roads, and water and sanitation systems. Those areas 
are considered to be in ``acute food and livelihood crisis.'' 
Indonesia is located at the center of the volatile geographic 
region known as the Ring of Fire. Earthquakes, volcanoes, 
typhoons, tsunamis, and other natural disasters devastate 
communities frequently, requiring significant and costly 
recovery.
    Self-sufficiency in food production is a top national 
security priority of Indonesian leaders, developed with a 
domestic political emphasis. The government has privileged rice 
production over the rest of agriculture in its growth programs. 
Large levels of soybean imports, for example, are a point of 
``lost face'' given the rising nationalism and maturing of 
democracy in the country. Indonesian leaders have not yet 
reconciled the political importance of food self-sufficiency 
with the economic benefits to the population of relying on free 
market principles.
    In November 2008, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said, 
``Indonesia must struggle to reach food self-sufficiency .  .  
. we have our own good resources with which to develop the 
agriculture sector. Fortunately, this year we have reached 
self-sufficiency in rice and corn. This year's increase in rice 
production is the greatest during the last 12 years.'' The 
President added that Indonesia's rice production was expected 
to reach 60 million tons this year, up 5.46%, from 57 tons last 
year.\34\ Indonesia imports significant amounts of soybeans, 
wheat, and corn, and is a major exporter of palm oil.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \34\ The Jakarta Post, ``Food self-reliance national priority: 
SBY'', November 13, 2008.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    In 2008, a group of experts met in Jakarta to discuss the 
causes of the price hikes and proposed action steps that 
Indonesia should implement to provide affordable food supplies 
for its citizens. Entitled ``Food Inflation: Challenges and 
Policy Prescriptions,'' the experts predicted that high food 
prices were here to stay in the foreseeable future. Rice 
distribution schemes were seen to provide relief to the poor in 
the short term; however, the experts agreed there were other, 
better solutions to control high food prices going forward. 
These involved incentives to increase the quality and quantity 
of supply, including improvements to irrigation infrastructure 
and farming technologies and schemes to help farmers meet 
international standards for food exports. If farmers directly 
benefited from high rice prices and were given incentives to 
increase production, this extra supply would put the brakes on 
higher prices, the experts said. It was notable, the experts 
warned, that increased production was not occurring in 
countries that imposed export restrictions to keep domestic 
food supplies low.\35\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \35\ Van Zorge Report, ``Food inflation: Challenges and policy 
prescriptions'', Vol. X, No. 10-11, June 17, 2008.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    ``Reused rice,'' that is rice scavenged from restaurant and 
street side stalls, rinsed off and sold at a discount, is a 
feature of some poor people's diets. There is also an active 
market for used cooking oil, which is filtered and bleached and 
resold. While local rice prices have yet to hit the record 
levels seen in the world market, they are still high enough to 
support significant switching from rice to wheat-based noodles 
as local flour millers report a steady demand for noodles. 
Fortified wheat noodles are sold in individual serving packages 
with seasonings, and are a common substitute for protein, often 
eaten at breakfast instead of rice. High wheat prices are also 
encouraging producers to look at technology to fortify noodles 
and to reduce production costs.
    The Indonesian government is emphasizing an increase in 
national production capacity for rice, maize, soybeans, sugar 
cane, and beef. The main agenda for revitalizing agriculture is 
redesigning the agricultural marketing system, developing 
farmer's cooperatives, developing infrastructure, enhancing 
agricultural science and technology implementation, and 
facilitating loan access for farmers.\36\ While government 
officials attempt to develop policies conducive to a healthy 
agriculture sector, many challenges exist, bureaucracy and 
corruption among them.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \36\ Agriculture Statistics, Ministry of Agriculture, 2007.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Although Indonesia imports transgenic goods, advances in 
Indonesian approval, use, or regulation of biotech products are 
not a priority for the government. The government issued a 
regulation for Biosafety of Transgenic Products, but 
implementation is not a priority. Given the global price runs 
for a number of commodities, however, Indonesia appears to be 
at the point where serious consideration of biotechnology could 
begin. This is especially true within the research community, 
though less clear within government regulatory bodies.
    The country has seen large-scale growth in higher 
education, now operating 89 public institutions serving more 
than 2 million students. There is a wide variety of vocational 
and specialty programs. Several universities have agricultural 
science programs at the equivalent of the Master's level in the 
U.S. system. More common are vocational programs that focus on 
agricultural practice and technology. Government financing for 
higher education was 2.4% of GDP in 2007. Beginning in 2009, 
the plan is to allocate at least 20% of the country's budget to 
education.
    Despite the number of schools offering vocational or other 
agricultural science degrees, staff found that problems exist 
with the quality of faculty, availability of essential 
laboratories and equipment, and funding for research. The 
faculty is insular with little engagement in research and 
scholarship being conducted elsewhere. It was suggested to 
staff that post-doctoral education is needed to reverse this 
trend.
    According to some estimates, deforestation has contributed 
to Indonesia being the third largest emitter of greenhouse 
gases after the United States and China.\37\ Forty precent of 
the forests that existed in 1950 were cleared in the following 
50 years, with forest cover falling from 162 million hectares 
to 98 million. Since 1996, deforestation appears to have 
increased to an average of 2 million hectares per year. Climate 
change may also pose challenges to Indonesia's agricultural 
productivity. A 2007 World Bank report projected that global 
warming could increase temperatures, shorten the rainy season, 
intensify rainfall, and reduce soil fertility by 2% to 8%.\38\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \37\ Kyodo News, ``Deforestation Puts Indonesia as 3rd Largest 
Greenhouse Gas Emitter,'' March 24, 2008.
    \38\ The World Bank, ``Climate Change Threatens Food Security, 
Health and Coastal Communities in Indonesia,'' June 4, 2007.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Outside of the Bali-Java region, the lack of adequate 
infrastructure among the archipelago poses hurdles to 
development. Much of the population has no access to roads, 
electricity, or adequate health infrastructure.

Vietnam

    Vietnam is a country of contradictions on the issue of food 
security. It is the world's second largest exporter of rice; 
however, large segments of the population do not have access to 
food of nutritional substance. Vietnam made an impressive shift 
in its Global Hunger Index from 23.9 in 1990 to 12.6 in 
2008,\39\ but the proportion of malnourished is 35.5%, 
according to IFPRI. The nutritional status of Vietnam's 
population has improved significantly during the last two 
decades, and severe child malnutrition has been reduced. 
However, challenges remain and the malnutrition rate of 
children is still very high. According to data from the 
national survey conducted in 2004, one-third of Vietnamese 
children were moderately or severely underweight. More than 4 
million children under age five were malnourished at the end of 
2007.\40\ While food is available in Vietnam, it is not 
affordable to many, nor is food of sufficient nutritional value 
available to all of the population. A reduction in the 
purchasing power of many Vietnamese households, especially 
poorer ones, presents a substantial risk that households that 
had risen above the poverty line will fall back below it. In 
this context, poorer women and children are particularly at 
risk since higher food prices can worsen their already 
precarious nutrition status.\41\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \39\ IFPRI 2008 Global Hunger Index.
    \40\ Counterpart International, ``Vietnam's Investment in 
Agriculture and Higher Education in Agricultural Sciences, Agricultural 
Extension,'' December 9, 2008.
    \41\ United Nations, ``Food Prices, Vulnerability and Food Security 
in Vietnam,'' Hanoi, October 2008.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    The government's focus on raising rice yield neglects 
support for a more diversified range of crops that could 
significantly affect malnutrition. In October of 2008, Deputy 
Prime Minister Nguyen Sinh Hung told a working session on food 
security of concerned government agencies that to ensure food 
security, the main targets are rice quality and yield, rather 
than expanding rice acreage. Despite progress made, the 
government acknowledges existing challenges. In May of 2008, 
Vietnam's Communist Party Executive Committee issued a 
resolution and an action plan on agriculture and rural 
development that identified several shortcomings. Those 
deficits include problems in sustaining agricultural growth, 
mobilizing resources, and transferring of science and 
technology. The government noted the slow process of 
restructuring the rural economy and labor structure.
    During 2006-2007, it is estimated that agriculture, 
including forestry and fishing, contributed about 3.7% to the 
country's GDP growth rate. The rural population accounts for 
73% of the total population. The rural workforce directly 
involved in agriculture, forestry, and fishing accounts for 54% 
of the total workforce nationwide. However, the movement of the 
rural workforce to urban areas is accelerating, and the rural 
workforce is consequently aging.
    Most of the country's commercial rice production occurs in 
the Mekong Delta, but climate change threatens to remove this 
area as a center of productivity.\42\ Farmers in the Mekong 
Delta grow three rice crops a year and produce more than half 
of Vietnam's paddy output, in addition to supplying more than 
90% of the grain for trading.\43\ Drying and storage 
deficiencies have negative effects on quality and 
profitability. Vietnam is the second among the top five nations 
in the world facing dangers caused by climate change and rising 
sea water. The Red River and Mekong Deltas are projected to 
suffer the heaviest consequences. Presently, unexpected storms, 
floods, and droughts have become fiercer, while coastal low 
land areas are on the verge of being submerged, and the Mekong 
Delta, the country's rice granary, is being intruded by water. 
Vietnam's Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment is 
devising a national program to cope with climate change and 
rising sea water in Vietnam, to be submitted to the National 
Assembly for action.\44\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \42\ The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development reports that 
the portions of commercial rice in different regions varies, about 25-
30% in the Red River delta, 8-10% in the northern mountainous area, 15-
20% in the central and central highland areas, 55-60% in the southeast 
region and 70-75% in the Mekong Delta.
    \43\ Reuters, ``Vietnam's Rice Exports Total 4.1 Million Tons.'' 
September 22, 2008.
    \44\ ``Natural Disaster Mitigation Newsletter,'' Vol. 6, June 2008, 
Ministry of Culture and Information, Hanoi.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Vietnam has turned to technology to help it cope with 
changing climatic conditions and to improve yield. It is 
putting a major emphasis on biotechnological research including 
GM, education and training, new crop development, food safety, 
and processing. The government of Vietnam spends up to $10 
million annually on biotechnology-related research. 
Preparations are underway for biotech field trials involving 
corn, soybeans, and cotton.\45\ Moving from a centrally planned 
to a market economy, Vietnam is rushing to absorb as much 
education and training as possible. The lack of proficiency in 
English by a majority of the population, including high school 
and college-age students, is an overwhelming challenge.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \45\ SFRC staff interview with Dr. Nguyen Quoc Vong, Director, 
Center for International Development, Hanoi University of Agriculture.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    New seed varieties are developed by government institutes, 
and are distributed through the agricultural extension network. 
The Agricultural Extension Center at the national level covers 
40% of the seed cost for a farmer's first planting with new 
seed. In the late 1980s, the Vietnamese government reversed its 
disastrous collectivization system, allocating land to farmers 
on long leases. There are now ten million small farm households 
averaging 0.6 hectares, and 100,000 larger farms averaging six 
hectares. With the majority of households having only 0.6 
hectares, Vietnam's land tenure may limit productivity.
    The university system is weak. A shortage of professors 
means that universities function at only 60% of capacity and 
the quality of education is affected. With two-thirds of the 
nation's population under the age of 20, Vietnam is struggling 
to cope with the growing demand for higher education. There are 
eight agricultural colleges, four managed by the Ministry of 
Education and four by the Ministry of Agriculture. University 
education is heavily theoretical and not practically oriented. 
Extension agents are not well-trained in coaching, 
facilitation, communication, or market perspectives. The U.S. 
National Academies, in conjunction with The Vietnam Education 
Foundation, recently completed a review of education in the 
agricultural sciences and recommended that reforms be 
implemented to address teaching methods, and curriculum, 
increase funding, integrate research and extension with 
teaching, and encourage greater cooperation between 
universities and government agricultural institutions.\46\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \46\ The National Academies, ``Observations on the Current Status 
of Education in the Agricultural Sciences in Vietnam,'' January 2007.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    One of the best ways for the U.S. to promote food security 
in Vietnam would be to emphasize programs to provide English 
instruction and English curriculum development within the 
country. Vietnamese government and agriculture officials, as 
well as leaders in higher education are ravenous for an 
elevated level of higher education projects between the two 
countries, including Vietnamese students studying in the U.S., 
American universities setting up operations in Vietnam, and 
other projects.
    Moderately Food Insecure. Three countries--The Philippines, 
Guatemala, and Uganda--were found to be moderately food secure, 
with many of the characteristics of the severely insecure, but 
with global hunger indices that indicate less severe rates of 
malnutrition. Some of the three show evidence of making the 
necessary investments in agriculture.

The Philippines

    The Philippines is a lower middle-income country with 
abundant natural resources and a well-educated population, but 
with a history of poor governance and political instability 
that has left the economy far below its potential. ``The 
Philippines is a rich country with a poor population,'' one 
U.S. embassy official said. Although the Philippines is a major 
producer and exporter of bananas, pineapple, and coconut (the 
former two from large commercial plantations, the latter from 
smallholders), it is the world's largest importer of rice, the 
main staple food. Imports meet 10% of domestic rice demand. 
Philippine panic buying is cited by many sources as the major 
driver in the unprecedented spike in rice prices, which more 
than doubled the cost of rice between January and May 2008, to 
$923 per ton. Agriculture accounts for more than one-third of 
employment, but less than 20% of GDP. The industrial (15% of 
the economy) and service (50%) sectors are concentrated largely 
in Manila and a few other big cities, with little spillover to 
rural areas; mining and fishing are also important sectors.
    The Philippines scores 14 on the Global Hunger Index, a 
figure that puts it well behind many of its East Asian 
neighbors, including China, Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia 
(but far better than Africa or South Asia). This year it was 
passed by Vietnam (12.6), an historically poorer country that 
is developing far faster. Poverty, population, and policy are 
among the keys to understanding the Philippines' food security 
situation. Despite pockets of prosperity in places like Manila 
and Cebu, 42% of the population lives on less than $2 a day, 
and remittances by overseas workers provide key support to the 
economy. The Philippines' population of 90 million is growing 
at 2.01% annually (down from a recent 2.36% rate), one of the 
fastest in Asia, adding another two million mouths to feed each 
year. Economists say the government's over-emphasis on 
promoting rice production inhibits agricultural diversification 
into more profitable crops where the Philippines may enjoy a 
relative advantage, and its policy of requiring that all rice 
be imported by the National Food Authority helps keep domestic 
rice prices well above world prices and raises the cost of food 
for the poor.
    According to the latest comprehensive survey from the 
Philippine National Nutrition Council, seven out of 10 
households are food insecure, more than a quarter of pre-
schoolers were underweight, 4.3 million families were living 
below the poverty line, and more than half of those were below 
subsistence level. An estimated 70% of the country's poor live 
in rural areas, with a particularly acute situation on the 
Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao, the large southern island 
that has been wracked for years by conflict and is home to a 
third of the total rural poor. Most of the provinces on 
Mindanao are listed as vulnerable, very vulnerable, or very, 
very vulnerable to food insecurity by the government. 
Nationwide, many of the food insecure are landless rural 
workers, others are small holder farmers and fishermen. (Along 
the coasts, 80% of fishermen's households are below the poverty 
line.) As part of a long-standing land reform program, plots 
are limited to five hectares, and the average farm is only 1.2 
hectares. Property rights are a problem. The urban poor are 
primarily slum dwellers and low-skill workers in Manila (pop: 
12 million) and a few other cities. Because the poor spend such 
a large proportion of their money on food, they are 
particularly vulnerable to rising food prices. A recent 
analysis by the Asian Development Bank projected that a 10% 
rise in food costs in the Philippines would increase the number 
of ``absolutely poor'' by 2.7 million persons.
    Arable farmland comprises 40% of the land area. However, 
its high population means the country has only a quarter of the 
arable land per capita of nearby Thailand. Of the cropped land, 
about 32% is for rice, or about four million hectares (vs. 9.8 
million hectares in Thailand). Officially, a bit less than half 
of the irrigable land is irrigated, but Department of 
Agriculture officials said many of the irrigation systems are 
in disrepair. Despite having rich soil, the Philippine 
archipelago suffers several disadvantages which make it 
difficult to produce bumper crops of rice. One, many of the 
islands are mountainous, particularly on the eastern side. Two, 
the country sits squarely in the Pacific typhoon belt, and gets 
hit by 15-20 typhoons a year. Three, it lacks large rivers with 
deltas suitable for large-scale rice production, as in 
Thailand, Vietnam, or Burma.
    Fertilizer is subsidized by the government, but critics say 
the program benefits mostly larger farmers and is an unwise use 
of scarce funds. It is also subject to abuse: during the staff 
visit, the headlines and TV news were dominated by revelations 
of an alleged $15 million ``fertilizer scam'' in which 
government officials are accused of funneling money to 
political cronies, charging 1000% over market rates, and 
general mismanagement (eg, delivering orchid fertilizer to rice 
farms). The government also offers advanced-variety seeds at 
half price to farmers (including hybrid seeds). Again, 
economists say this is wasteful because farmers have an 
economic incentive on their own to buy better seeds that would 
produce better yields, and many in fact do so on their own. One 
study suggests targeting the subsidies to areas where farmers 
are not widely using advanced varieties. The government, 
through the NFA, sets a floor price for rice, and also markets 
some rice to consumers at subsidized prices.
    Philippine farmers took good advantage of initial Green 
Revolution varieties and techniques, and they benefit from one 
of the largest agricultural research systems in Asia. GMO 
technology is well-regulated and more or less accepted. The 
government is promoting more use of hybrid seeds, which can 
dramatically increase yields (but have to be repurchased every 
year): the barrier appears to be difficulty in finding the 
right hybrids to match up with different regional conditions 
rather than cost or institutional resistance by farmers. The 
International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) is located 40 
miles south of Manila, on the campus of the University of the 
Philippines Los Baos (UPLB), the nation's premier agricultural 
research university. However, government officials and outside 
experts agreed that extension services are weak because, under 
a 1990s decentralization program, responsibility was devolved 
to the provincial level. The federal Department of Agriculture 
used to have 50,000 extension workers. Now it has none, and is 
estimated that the provincial total may not be half that.
    Since the period immediately after World War II, when it 
was the second richest country in Asia (after Japan), the 
Philippines has been plagued by a dysfunctional governing 
system, largely dominated by land-holding elites and 
traditional political families (the current president, Gloria 
Macapagal-Arroyo, is the daughter of a former president), that 
is prone to corruption, cronyism, populism, and political 
gamesmanship (during the staff visit, lawmakers launched their 
fourth annual impeachment motion against the president). While 
other East Asian countries were experiencing economic takeoff 
in the last part of the 20th century, the Philippine scene was 
characterized by the 21-year reign of the kleptocratic dictator 
Marcos and the perennially coup-threatened Cory Aquino 
presidency. Despite widespread English fluency, an affinity for 
Americans and American culture, and lavish attention by U.S. 
administrations over the years, the Philippines has managed to 
squander one of its most important assets, its human capital: 
nearly 10% of its citizens live and work abroad because they 
are unable to find meaningful employment at home.
    Governance, corruption, too-slow economic growth, and too-
fast population growth are the backdrop for the Philippines' 
food security problems, which are directly related to income 
inequality, poverty, and particularly, persistent rural 
poverty. Clearly, major reforms are needed in the rice import 
policy, but donor attempts to effect policy reform have a 
notoriously unhappy history. Equally clearly, some targeted 
interventions could help: support to strengthen the research 
base to help achieve the needed productivity gains as well as 
strategies to rebuild extension services; infrastructure 
assistance aimed at small scale irrigation that will help 
smaller farmers and promote crop diversification and rural road 
improvement; other rural development efforts to tackle directly 
the rural poverty issue and increased fisheries productivity to 
address the acute poverty of that population. USAID points out 
that promoting good governance in implementing such 
interventions should also be a priority.

Guatemala

    Guatemala is a country of adequate arable land mass and 
other necessary attributes to prosper agriculturally. 
Agricultural industries associated with the production of 
products such as sugar, coffee, bananas, and latex, among 
others, are highly organized and largely employ modern 
technology on large land holdings. However, Guatemala 
increasingly must rely on imports for staple food crops such as 
maize and beans which, in the event of global food shortages, 
could expose a country where a majority of the rural population 
is considered malnourished, to economic and political turmoil.
    Agricultural growth in Guatemala is stagnant. There are a 
number of factors that contribute to this condition. Guatemala 
is a country affected by social tension among its population, 
with an urban population base that largely traces its roots to 
European settlement and an indigenous populations that is 
rural-based. These tensions were manifest in armed conflicts as 
late as 1996 when peace agreements were signed.
    The current government under President Alvaro Colom, the 
first to be elected by carrying the rural vote, has instituted 
a number of well intentioned programs to improve the well being 
of rural residents. Included in the programs are direct cash 
transfers and food donations to citizens of the poorest 
communities, as well as rural development and extension 
initiatives under the newly created ProRural, an effort 
established by President Colom and directly managed by his 
wife, first lady Sandra Torres, to oversee food security and 
rural development issues. Because these are executive branch 
initiatives, there is concern about their continuity and 
funding especially if the next president does not enjoy strong 
rural support. It is also unclear how these programs will mesh 
with legislatively created bodies such as the Ministry of 
Agriculture, Livestock and Food (MAGA). A civil service in the 
Guatemalan government is virtually non-existent, further 
hampering long-term development and continuity.
    Guatemala ranks first in Latin America and sixth worldwide 
in chronic malnutrition. Malnutrition affects 36% of women of 
child-bearing age and newborns and nearly 50% of children under 
five are chronically malnourished. The pattern of overall 
malnutrition is one of social and economic inequality and 
follows that of extreme poverty with rates higher among 
indigenous populations and those in rural areas. The most 
important crops, in regard to food security, are corn, beans, 
and rice. According to the FAO, 75% of Guatemalan households 
only consume five products: corn tortillas, beans, eggs, 
tomatoes, and sweet bread. The Agriculture, Resources, and 
Environmental Institute of the Unisersidad de Rafael Landivar 
(IARNA) established that the contribution of basic grains to 
per capita intake of energy and protein is quite high: 37.7% 
and 36.5% for corn, 9.5% and 22.9% for beans.
    The basic grain market is not sufficiently developed; 
significant gaps exist such as inadequate networks for storage, 
drying, sale, and distribution. Specifically, small-scale 
producers do not fully participate in the market. Their 
participation is limited to selling products during the 
harvest. These producers tend to sell their crops to 
intermediaries who pay low prices, particularly when products 
are available, like at harvest time. Gaps in the market can be 
defined as the conditions that hamper adequate competition. 
Some of the deficiencies identified by staff include: the lack 
of adequate market information for farmers; unequal access to 
capital; and the inability of small farmers to influence 
prices.
    There are areas of the country that are more food insecure 
than others. The departments of Totonicapan, San Marcos, Alta 
Verapaz, Quiche, Huehuetenango, and Peten have the highest risk 
indices and food and nutrition insecurity rates, according to 
SESAN, the Food and Nutritional Security Secretariat. One of 
the main reasons for the difference in food insecurity is the 
high level of poverty that characterizes these departments. 
Thirty-nine (39) of the 41 municipalities classified by 
SEGEPLAN, Executive Secretariat for Planning and Programs, as 
having indices that surpass 90% poverty are located in these 
six departments. It is also worth noting that of the 30 
municipalities that SEGEPLAN identifies as having the highest 
rates of exclusion or marginalization from full participation 
in society, 24 are located in these six departments.
    There are regions in Guatemala in which the incidence of 
overall malnutrition is higher, such as the northwestern 
region, in which 31% of children under five weigh less than 
normal, while in the Metropolitan region, the percentage goes 
down to 15%. Additionally, the mother's level of education is a 
determining factor in reducing overall malnutrition. The 
prevalence of malnutrition in children whose mothers have had 
no schooling is 30% compared to about 9% in children whose 
mothers have had at least secondary education.
    According to the views of the Inter-American Institute for 
Cooperation on Agriculture, the most critical aspect of the 
issue of food security in Guatemala is the lack of food that is 
sufficiently nutritious, potable water, and adequate 
sanitation. Food access and availability are also problems. 
Excess or insufficient rain, damage to infrastructure, and crop 
losses from pests and diseases are factors that also contribute 
to food insecurity in certain sectors of the population.
    About 25% of Guatemala's land is suitable for agriculture. 
Forest cover, which constitutes 43% of the national territory, 
is rapidly disappearing. The FAO estimates that the country has 
lost 50% of the forests that existed in 1950. According to 
estimates from the National Forest Institute (INAB), Guatemala 
loses about 73,000 hectares per year to deforestation, of which 
nearly 29,000 hectares are found within protected areas. The 
annual deforestation rate is estimated to be 1.71%.
    Under the structural adjustment policy applied in the 
1980s, the government sold off or leased part of the 
infrastructure of the National Agricultural Marketing Institute 
(INDECA), which had the capacity to store 54,841 MT. As a 
result, the country has no capacity to store surpluses or 
strategic reserves. The country needs to restore this lost 
capacity. The Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock (MAGA) is 
currently executing the Post-harvest Program, which focuses on 
promoting the use of and constructing metal silos. National 
demand for silos exceeds 1.1 million units; to date, only 10% 
have been built.
    In addition to storage capacity, other critical needs are 
road construction, and road improvements for the movement of 
food into food deficient areas and agricultural inputs to 
increase food production. Guatemala does not maintain railroad 
capacity, and it is estimated that 1700 km of roads must be 
paved and 300 km of new roads must be built in order to 
optimize existing potential. Passable all-weather roads are 
important to link production to markets.
    The pattern of land holding also poses problems. In 
Guatemala 2% of the population owns 72% of all the agricultural 
land. According to the 2004 agricultural/livestock census, 45% 
of farms measures less than 0.7 hectares, and constituted 3.2% 
of the national territory; 46.8% were farms measuring between 
0.7 and 7 hectares, and occupied 18.6% of the national 
territory, while 8% of total farms that had areas larger than 7 
hectares covered 78.2% of the national territory.
    Government plans and projects focus mainly on rural areas, 
especially the 45 municipalities with the highest levels of 
poverty and food insecurity. The MAGA and the ProRural are 
responsible for implementing actions aimed at boosting 
agricultural production as a means of improving food security 
and generating surpluses for the market. To do this, it 
provides small producers with fertilizers, seeds, tools, and 
some infrastructure, such as mini-irrigation systems and 
greenhouses. This is complemented with credit to lease land 
through FONTIERRA (Fondo de Tierras), Guatemala's land 
registration office, which in turn provides technical 
assistance. Implementation of the government's food security 
policy is supported by the Ministry of Public Health and Social 
Welfare (MSPAS). The measures adopted by the government to 
address the rise in prices and the problem of food insecurity 
can be summed up as the reduction of tariffs on food imports, 
subsidies on agricultural inputs, distribution of agricultural 
inputs, agreements on intergovernmental cooperation in the 
production of staple grains, and food distribution programs.
    In recent years, budget resources for agriculture have 
averaged about 3% of the total budget. It should be pointed 
out, however, that rural areas benefit from additional 
resources provided by other agencies for specific projects 
aimed at helping populations highly vulnerable to malnutrition 
or those that live in territories subject to environmental 
disasters.
    At present, the public sector does not have a well-defined 
strategy for research and extension services. Some non-
governmental organizations and specific projects have technical 
assistance and training components, but the limited scale has 
not caused any visible effect on productivity. Current 
Guatemalan extension services are under the authority of MAGA, 
although the government has begun to put in place extension 
capacity through the newly established ProRural. ProRural plans 
to implement a version of development models published in 
studies sponsored by the Universidad Rafael Landviar's IARNA. 
Those studies suggest that an agricultural growth rate of 5% 
per year in the highlands would have significant effects on 
poverty reduction, and that the production of horticultural 
crops would be best to achieve these growth rates. ProRural has 
added a number of food crop foci and plans to maintain 
extension services in 125 prioritized municipalities. As 
ProRural is funded by residual resources from the annual 
budget, it is unclear if long-term sustainability of these 
services will be ensured through actual budget authority.
    Agricultural research conducted by the Guatemalan 
government is done through the Institute of Agricultural 
Science and Technology (ICTA), but it has been downsized in 
recent years. Ninety precent of its budget is used to pay for 
salaries and basic services. Assistance to organized producer 
groups and individual farmers has been drastically reduced. 
Technical training is practically non-existent in most 
production areas.
    Though some research activities are being conducted by 
private agricultural entities, the technical and professional 
service sector for agriculture is not well developed. There are 
very few firms that offer technical consulting services and 
diagnostic laboratories, due in part, to underdeveloped 
markets, and substandard business and agriculture education 
provided by technological schools. This is beginning to change 
as private agricultural enterprises are increasing their demand 
for specialized services.
    Guatemala has four agricultural science schools including 
the Universidad de San Carlos, the Universidad de Rafael 
Landivar, the Universidad del Valle de Guatemala, and the 
Universidad Rural. The Universidad de San Carlos is public and 
offers free education, while the others are private. The first 
three universities have research institutes with modern 
laboratories and agricultural land, though funding is severely 
limited.
    The capacity of Guatemala to take advantage of 
technological advances such as genetically modified seed is 
limited. The Law for Environmental Protection and Improvement 
and the Law to Establish the Ministry of the Environment and 
Natural Resources broadly govern and regulate transgenic 
products. Additionally, under the National Food and Nutritional 
Security Policy, a central principle is that of precaution. 
Under this principle, an importer of food products must prove 
and guarantee its safety. Guatemala is a signatory party to the 
Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, a supplement to the Convention 
on Biological Diversity that aims to regulate the handling of 
live modified organisms and stipulates a nation's ability to 
limit importation of these products.

Uganda

    The overall food security picture in Uganda is good and 
improving but persistent poor policy and incoherent planning 
could reverse this trend. Nature has afforded Uganda a buffer 
that is not sustainable over the long-term given a 3.3% 
population growth rate and continued reliance on small-scale 
farming with limited modern farm inputs. Although there is 
additional arable land to be cultivated, it is insufficient to 
meet future requirements if current policies and practices 
continue. Traditional inheritance of land primarily to men, and 
by generations of subdivision, combined with poor farming 
methods will quickly dissipate the advantage through soil 
degradation and decreasing yield. Uganda's per capita 
productivity in agriculture has already been trending 
negatively and has returned Uganda to being a net importer of 
food. Hunger in Uganda is due to marginalized and conflict 
areas afflicted with natural disasters but is also beginning to 
show the shortcomings of government policy and priorities given 
a burgeoning population and unpredictable commodities and 
financial markets.
    About 80% of the workforce is employed by agriculture, of 
which some 20% work in commercial agriculture. While Uganda has 
fertile land, vast water resources, and a diversity of 
agriculture, livestock, and fishery resources, nearly 10% of 
its population suffers from extreme and chronic food 
insecurity, according to U.S. government sources. The 
International Food Policy Research Institute estimates that 
nearly 19% of the population is undernourished.
    Uganda scores 17.1 on the Global Hunger Index, a figure far 
better than the 23 point average for sub-Saharan Africa, but 
one more difficult to interpret correctly given the sharp 
disparity between the north and south of the country. In the 
north, 61% live below the poverty line, while only 16% do in 
the south. The dichotomy between the two parts of the country 
is mainly due to conflict in the north, but is exacerbated by 
government policies that treat each region differently. The 
southern half of the country, which has been conflict free for 
over 20 years, is able to produce sufficiently to assure food 
security. Though the agriculture sector is primarily small-
scale and in need of reforms, there is a vibrant commercial 
sector as well. The central and southern population is far 
better off and more resilient to shocks from price fluctuations 
or environmental conditions than their counterparts in the 
north and northeast. Ugandan government policy still requires 
considerable improvement for maximizing growth, but the 
opportunity exists if the government does not continue to 
neglect rural development and the agriculture sector. There is 
a clear policy of dependence on donors, and an almost single-
minded reliance on the private sector and market forces to 
drive agricultural development.
    The north, on the other hand, has been viewed as an area of 
opposition to the government of President Museveni and has 
suffered from years of marginalization and neglect, as well as 
an ongoing guerilla type conflict with the Lord's Resistance 
Army (LRA). Only recently has the nearly 20-year conflict with 
the LRA abated. The LRA has been driven from the country, 
albeit not very far away, and hundreds of thousands of 
internally displaced are emptying from IDP camps to return 
home. The situation has improved markedly in the past two 
years. Nonetheless, though there is now government rhetoric 
toward development of this region, policy remains negligent of 
the need in the north. It is in fact the donor community and 
some private sector investors that are the main agents for 
growth in this region. The government remains aloof to the 
challenge and the opportunities to translate this recent peace 
into a national leap toward middle income status. Only through 
a political and budgetary commitment will the north contribute 
to the continued economic growth of Uganda. A chronic conflict 
zone due to high criminality still exists in the northeast 
Karamoja region--a pastoral and agro-pastoral mixed farming 
area with difficult climatic conditions. It is caught in a 
cycle of natural disasters (3 failed harvests in a row), 
conflict, and limited investment, all of which have perpetuated 
underdevelopment and chronic hunger for the million or so 
inhabitants.
    Uganda's growing population will put pressure on the gains 
made in the last few years with regard to food security. At 
current rates of growth, its population will double by 2040 
despite its low life expectancy rate of below 50 years. 
Relatively poor productivity and the rate of productivity per 
capita in agriculture are declining. There is significant 
potential for increased productivity given the natural 
advantages nature has provided Uganda. Staff was told that if 
farmers were to introduce one of several inputs such as 
irrigation, better fertilizer, or improved seeds, the country 
could easily quadruple current yield. According to the FAO, 
about 30% of Uganda is cultivable, but less than half is under 
cultivation, and only 0.1% of cultivated land is irrigated. 
Deforestation poses a serious problem. From 1990 to 2005, 
Uganda lost 25% of its woodland areas, largely from illegal 
logging and charcoal manufacturing. Currently, only 18.4% of 
the country is forested.
    The agriculture sector is largely dependent on small- and 
medium-sized farmers with average national land holdings of 2.5 
hectares per farmer. Land tenure is stable, and while the 
average holding is larger than in most of the rest of Africa, 
continual subdivision with each generation will significantly 
affect the situation. Principal food crops are bananas, 
cereals, root crops, pulses, oil seeds, and fruits and 
vegetables. Fertilizer and seed are imported at great expense, 
thereby limiting their use by smallholder farmers. Livestock 
comprises 14% of agricultural GDP or 5% of total GDP, mostly 
owned by smallholders, but there has been no significant 
increase since 1990 in the population or productivity of the 
livestock sector. Road infrastructure is uneven throughout the 
country and limits the mobility of crops. In addition, as a 
land-locked country, Uganda has had to rely on Kenya and 
Tanzania for a seaward outlet.
    Poverty eradication is a fundamental objective of Uganda's 
development strategy, in which the government has resolved to 
reduce the proportion of the population living in absolute 
poverty to 10% by 2017. The government has chosen to allow the 
market to drive the development of the agricultural sector, and 
it lags in necessary investments in the support structure, such 
as research and extension. The emphasis of the government's 
Poverty Eradication Action Plan (PEAP) of 1997 and the ensuing 
Plan for Modernization of Agriculture (PMA) of 2000 pursued the 
goal of ``eradicating poverty by transforming subsistence 
agriculture to commercial agriculture. Improving the welfare of 
poor subsistence farmers will require that they re-orient their 
production towards the market.'' Government policy to rely 
almost exclusively on the private sector to drive development 
does not give it much leverage to direct how and where that 
development occurs. Government investments in agricultural 
inputs, such as irrigation, are designed to help the commercial 
sector produce high value crops for export. However, the 
government is taking actions in tax and incentives to promote a 
better environment for farm investment and productivity 
improvements. In addition, the government has tripled micro-
finance and provided a recent massive injection of resources 
for transportation infrastructure, primarily road-building, 
that has an important positive effect on rural development.
    The emphasis on the market and on reducing public sector 
activities is most evident in the realm of academia, research, 
and extension. The dilapidated nature of these three areas has 
led to a very low agriculture sector output growth of 0.4% in 
2008 and years of declining per capita agricultural output. 
Existing government programs to disseminate better farming 
practices are under-resourced in both funding and personnel.
    The National Agriculture Research Organization (NARO) is 
tasked with research on better crop and animal breeds so as to 
increase food and animal production in the country aimed at 
eradicating poverty. There are six National Agriculture 
Research Institutes and nine Zonal Research Facilities. The 
head of NARO recently appealed to the government to increase 
funding of the organization so as to enable researchers to come 
up with viable projects which will help improve household 
incomes. He has pointed out that the organization lacks enough 
staff and equipment to carry out effective research. Many 
donors and observers criticize the government for ignoring the 
agriculture sector, while other government sectors, like 
security and administration, receive far more funding than the 
agriculture sector. With regard to genetically modified 
technology, Uganda's cabinet approved its first National 
Biotechnology and Biosafety Policy in April 2008, after eight 
years of deliberation. The policy provides objectives and 
guidelines for the promotion and regulation of biotechnology 
use in the country. But for the policy to be implemented, 
Parliament must pass a law to that effect.
    The relatively new National Agricultural Advisory Services 
(NAADS) program of Uganda is an innovative public-private 
extension service delivery approach, with the goal of 
increasing market oriented agricultural production by 
empowering farmers to demand and control agricultural advisory 
services. It appears that the NAADS program is having 
substantial positive impacts, in areas where it is working, on 
the availability and quality of advisory services provided to 
farmers, promoting adoption of new crop and livestock 
enterprises as well as improving adoption and use of modern 
agricultural production technologies and practices. NAADS also 
appears to have promoted greater use of post-harvest 
technologies and commercial marketing of commodities, 
consistent with its mission to promote more commercially-
oriented agriculture. Despite positive effects of NAADS on 
selected areas and agricultural products, wider adoption of 
improved production technologies and practices is still 
difficult.
    The university system, led by Makerere University in 
Kampala, is limited by the lack of sufficient government 
resources to adequately address baccalaureate and post-graduate 
education and research to effectively produce increased numbers 
of graduates in academia and sciences. Uganda is able to retain 
its graduates due to the economic growth rate in the country. 
The universities do have agriculture science departments but 
are underfunded. One official pointed out the deficiencies by 
showing a university laboratory funded by outside donors and 
another completely in disrepair funded by the government.

                               Conclusion

    The steep food price increases of the last two years have 
abated for the time being, but prices remain high in many parts 
of the world. The crisis that reached its zenith in 2008 
demonstrated the fragility of global agriculture, and how 
quickly disruptions in one region can spread to other regions. 
The international community has failed to understand the 
necessity of maintaining investments in agriculture for both 
food production and poverty alleviation. People have been 
lulled into complacency by decades of low food prices without 
looking ahead to expected increases in population growth, 
urbanization, environmental degradation, energy supply 
disruptions, and demand for non-food crops. Farmers around the 
world will be asked to meet the demands created by these 
factors, even as they may be contending with a degrading 
agricultural environment that significantly depresses yields in 
some regions. Unless much greater effort is devoted to this 
problem, the world is likely to experience more frequent and 
intense food crises that increase migration, stimulate 
conflicts, intensify pandemics, and exacerbate poverty.
    Solving hunger is both a moral and national security 
imperative. The United States should assume a leadership role 
in addressing hunger, poverty, and increasing global food 
production. To do so requires increased investments in 
agriculture and rural development, education, research, 
science, technology, and extension. As Senator Lugar has 
stated, ``The United States cannot feed every person, lift 
every person out of poverty, cure every disease, or stop every 
conflict. But our power and status have conferred upon us a 
tremendous responsibility to humanity.''
    Senators Lugar and Casey have introduced legislation, the 
Global Food Security Act of 2009 that promotes these policy 
initiatives as centerpieces of U.S. foreign assistance policy. 
The bill is included as an appendix in this report.
                               APPENDICES

                              ----------                              


                   Appendix A.--Additional Resources

    Asian Development Bank: Soaring Food Prices: Response to 
the Crisis, May 2008.
    Chicago Council on Global Affairs: ``Renewing American 
Leadership in the Fight Against Global Hunger and Poverty'' 
White Paper, December 2008.
    Food and Agriculture Organization: The State of Food 
Insecurity in the World 2008.
    Food and Agriculture Organization: The State of Food 
Insecurity in Asia and the Pacific Region 2008.
    Government Accountability Office: International Food 
Security: Insufficient Efforts by Host Governments and Donors 
Threaten Progress to Halve Hunger in Sub-Saharan Africa by 
2015, May 2008.
    International Food Policy Research Institute: Global Hunger 
Index, The Challenge of Hunger 2008, October 2008.
    International Food Policy Research Institute: ``Investing 
in Agriculture to Overcome the World Food Crisis and Reduce 
Poverty and Hunger,'' by Shenggen Fan and Mark W. Rosegrant, 
June 2008.
    International Food Policy Research Institute: 
``International Agricultural Research for Food Security, 
Poverty Reduction, and the Environment: What to Expect from 
Scaling Up CGIAR Investments and `Best Bet' Programs,'' by 
Joachim von Braun, Shennggen Fan, Ruth Meinzen-Dick, Mark W. 
Rosegrant, and Alejandro Nin Pratt, 2008.
    International Food Policy Research Institute: Agricultural 
Science and Technology Indicators, Country Briefs.
    Juma, Calestous, ``Agricultural Innovation and Economic 
Growth in Africa: Renewing International Cooperation,'' 
International Journal of Technology and Globalisation, Vol. 4., 
No. 3, 2008.
    Natsios, Andrew S. and Kelly W. Doley, ``The Coming Food 
Crisis,'' The Washington Quarterly, Vol. 32, No. 1, January 
2009.
    Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development: 
Policy Brief, Agriculture: Improving Policy Coherence for 
Development.
    Paarlberg, Robert, Starved for Science: How Biotechnology 
is Being Kept Out of Africa, Cambridge: Harvard University 
Press, 2008.
    Timmer, Peter C. and David Dawe, ``Managing Food Price 
Instability in Asia: A Macro Food Security Perspective,'' East 
Asian Economic Association, Vol. 21, No. 1, 2007.
    United States Agency for International Development: 
Securing the Future: A Strategy for Economic Growth, April 
2008.
    United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research 
Service: Food Security Assessment, 2007, July 2008.
    World Bank: World Development Report 2008: Agriculture for 
Development, 2007.
    World Bank: Development Outreach, October 2008.
                              ----------                              


             Appendix B.--Global Food Security Act of 2009

    S. 384 The Global Food Security Act of 2009. To authorize 
appropriations for fiscal years 2010 through 2014 to provide 
assistance to foreign countries to promote food security, to 
stimulate rural economies, and to improve emergency response to 
food crises, to amend the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, and 
for other purposes.
    For the entire bill, see: http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/
cgi-bin/ 
getdoc.cgi?dbname=111_cong_bills&docid=f:s384is.txt.pdf

                                  
