The last stage of food deprivation is famine. Nearly 170 years ago, in the 1840s, Ireland was ravaged by a devastating famine. Known as the “Potato Famine”, it left the nation in ruins. History records that no other famine has claimed so many lives.
It is said that the population of Ireland has still not recovered to the level it stood at before the catastrophic famine of 1845. At different times, China, India, Ethiopia, and even Bangladesh were haunted by the spectre of famine. That said, famines are rarely reported in today’s world, not even in this subcontinent, including Bangladesh. One must admit that the expansion of modern technology, remarkable improvements in communications, and income-generating programmes taken up by governments and private entities have largely pushed famine into the background.
Still, an understanding of famine remains essential, as it is the final nail in the coffin of food shortages.
Food crisis and perspectives
In this context, let us recall a dialogue from George Bernard Shaw’s Man and Superman. The wealthy Irish-American, Malone, refuses to acknowledge the famine of the 1840s. When his daughter-in-law Violet says: “My father starved to death in the Black ‘47 famine”, Malone retorts: “Not famine—starvation. When a country is full of food, and exporting it, there can be no famine.”
Questions can certainly be raised about Malone’s facts on food surpluses. But in his simple mind lay a belief that as long as surplus food existed in a country, no one could die of hunger. Surplus food, to him, closed the door on famine.
Yet Shakespeare’s Hamlet reminds us: “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” Indeed, many things were beyond Malone’s imagination. The harsh truth is that famines in many countries did not arise from food shortages but from people’s lack of money—or loss of purchasing power—to buy food. The pertinent question, therefore, is: on what factors does the right to food depend?
Entitlement and access to food
In tackling hunger today, it is crucial to explore the wider causes of famine. Food security cannot simply be reduced to a mechanical balance between food supply and population. The more critical factor is whether an individual has the freedom to command sufficient food—through self-production (like farmers) or through market purchases (like wage-earners).
Despite plentiful supplies, a person may starve if they cannot afford to buy food or if their purchasing power collapses. This may occur because of unemployment or failure to sell their produce in the market. Conversely, even in times of shortages, crises may be mitigated by imports or collective consumption.
Thus, a household’s entitlement—or food security—depends on several factors. First, on resources under its control that hold market value and can be exchanged for food. For most people, this resource is labour power—the ability to sell physical labour to earn food. In this way, labour, land, and other resources shape household entitlement. Second, entitlements are determined by production possibilities and how these are utilised. Technology plays a key role here: the application of knowledge and skills to enhance production strengthens food security. Finally, entitlements depend on exchange conditions, such as commodity prices and wage levels.
During economic crises, some groups suffer disproportionately. In the Bengal famine of 1943, for instance, exchange rates between food and other goods shifted overnight. Fishermen were hit hardest because the relative price of fish to rice declined steeply. Though fish itself was food, poor fishermen relied on selling fish to buy rice—the cheapest source of calories. Similarly, barbers were doubly disadvantaged: demand for haircuts fell as low-income groups cut expenses, and their relative exchange rate for services against food also dropped, in some districts by as much as 70–80%.
Nutrition and productivity
An increase in food intake does not automatically translate into higher productivity. About 60% of daily food intake is spent merely on keeping the body’s functions—such as heat, kidney function, circulation, and heartbeat—going. Economists call this resting metabolism, or fixed cost. Hence, without meeting this metabolic threshold, extra intake does not necessarily raise productivity.
Older people, too, face reduced capacity to digest additional food. For them, higher consumption may even reduce efficiency.
Defining food security
Food security can be simply defined as access to adequate food for all people to lead active and healthy lives. In other words, when everyone has enough food to live productively and healthily, food security is achieved. This depends both on the availability of food and the ability to obtain it.
Food security can be viewed at both national and household levels. At the national level, it means maintaining sufficient reserves to meet domestic demand until replenished by harvests or imports. At the household level, it means every member of society must have access to food—through production, the market, or public provision.
Bangladesh’s struggle with food security
Based on bitter famine experiences, both before and after the Second World War (and even into the early 1970s), self-sufficiency in food was equated with food security. Keeping rice prices stable through higher production was a key goal. Since independence, rice production in Bangladesh has tripled. Along with impressive infrastructure and faster economic growth, this has transformed the country’s food economy. For the first time in history, food output has surpassed targets.
Yet, it cannot be said that Bangladesh has secured food security. Nor can one be sure that such achievements can be sustained in the face of fragile natural resources and population pressures. Frequent floods, droughts, and cyclones threaten internal production and trigger shortages.
Most importantly, while the supply of staple foods has grown satisfactorily, the availability of other foods has not. Still, about 40% of people cannot consume the minimum daily requirement of 2,122 calories per head and thus remain under the poverty line. To make matters worse, recent spikes in food prices have severely affected industrial and agricultural workers and those in the informal sector, aggravating their livelihoods.
The writer is an economist and former Vice-Chancellor of Jahangirnagar University
