Food Security In Ethiopia
Willene Joan D’ Costa
NASE 318
Professor Kiszewski
12/11/14
Food Security in Ethiopia
Ethiopia, located in Sub Saharan Africa, is one of the many countries in the world that is the most affected by food insecurity. Food security in Ethiopia has comparatively improved in recent years. However, due to factors such as political set up, severe poverty, climate, etc., this problem is far from being solved.
In recent years, Ethiopia’s economy has grown considerably as compared to other Sub-Saharan countries. However, on the United Nations Development Project’s HDI, Ethiopia is ranked 174th (out of 187 countries); approximately 29% of all Ethiopians live below the poverty line (IFAD 2014). It has been estimated that more than 3 million of Ethiopia’s total population has been haunted by the lack of a secure access to food (Bomba, Glickman).
The main occupation in Ethiopia is agriculture. Yet food insecurity still persists. Due to monetary and political reasons only 25% of the total cultivable land is actually being used (IFAD 2014). A majority of the land being used to cultivate crops is only being used for subsistence farming which has very low productivity; 12.7 million smallholder farmers harvest approximately 95% of the country’s agricultural GDP (IFAD 2014). Due to this nature of farming practices, these farmers are exceedingly vulnerable to volatile global markets, social unrest, famine and drought, and other natural disasters. Smallholder farmers form the largest group of poverty ridden Ethiopians as a majority of them struggle to cultivate enough food to for the sustenance of their households. Another major factor to overall food insecurity is climate and the lack of adequate rainfall. Due to increasing global temperatures as well as the location of Ethiopia in terms of its proximity to the equator, prolonged and severe droughts have become more frequent over the last few years and this trend is expected to worsen over time. This sort of climate has a huge
NASE 318
Professor Kiszewski
12/11/14
Food Security in Ethiopia
Ethiopia, located in Sub Saharan Africa, is one of the many countries in the world that is the most affected by food insecurity. Food security in Ethiopia has comparatively improved in recent years. However, due to factors such as political set up, severe poverty, climate, etc., this problem is far from being solved.
In recent years, Ethiopia’s economy has grown considerably as compared to other Sub-Saharan countries. However, on the United Nations Development Project’s HDI, Ethiopia is ranked 174th (out of 187 countries); approximately 29% of all Ethiopians live below the poverty line (IFAD 2014). It has been estimated that more than 3 million of Ethiopia’s total population has been haunted by the lack of a secure access to food (Bomba, Glickman).
The main occupation in Ethiopia is agriculture. Yet food insecurity still persists. Due to monetary and political reasons only 25% of the total cultivable land is actually being used (IFAD 2014). A majority of the land being used to cultivate crops is only being used for subsistence farming which has very low productivity; 12.7 million smallholder farmers harvest approximately 95% of the country’s agricultural GDP (IFAD 2014). Due to this nature of farming practices, these farmers are exceedingly vulnerable to volatile global markets, social unrest, famine and drought, and other natural disasters. Smallholder farmers form the largest group of poverty ridden Ethiopians as a majority of them struggle to cultivate enough food to for the sustenance of their households. Another major factor to overall food insecurity is climate and the lack of adequate rainfall. Due to increasing global temperatures as well as the location of Ethiopia in terms of its proximity to the equator, prolonged and severe droughts have become more frequent over the last few years and this trend is expected to worsen over time. This sort of climate has a huge