Khaleej Times, 8/21/02

ROME - The world's population will reach 8.3 billion by 2030, but people overall will be better fed despite continuing problems in many countries and especially in Africa, according to a new study by the UN's Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO). "World population will grow from around six billion people today to 8.3 billion people in 2030," said the study, entitled "World Agriculture: towards 2015/2030."

"The world population will be increasingly well-fed by 2030, with 3,050 kilocalories (kcal) available per person, compared to 2,360 kcal per person per day in the mid-1960s and 2,800 kcal today," the report said. "This change reflects above all the rising consumption in many developing countries whose average will be close to 3,000 kcal in 2030," it says. The overall picture for developing countries is moderately encouraging, with the number of hungry people expected to decline from 777 million today to about 440 million in 2030, the report said.

This meant, however, that the target of the World Food Summit in 1996, to reduce the number of hungry by half from its level in 1990-92 (815 million), by 2015, will not even be met by 2030. The study stresses that "Sub-Saharan Africa is a cause for serious concern, because the number of chronically undernourished people will only decrease from 194 to 183 million." "Patterns of food consumption are becoming more similar throughout the world, shifting towards higher quality and more expensive foods such as meat and dairy products," the study says.

It adds however that cereals will by far remain the world's most important source of food, and that an extra billion tonnes of cereals will be needed by 2030. The study draws special attention to the issues of water supply and irrigation. "At global level there is enough water available, but... one in five developing countries will be suffering water scarcity" by 2030, the study says.

The FAO singles out Libya, Saudi Arabia and large parts of China and India as high risk areas. It called on developing countries to extend their irrigation systems from 202 million hectares (500 million acres) to 242 million hectares (600 million acres) by 2030. The study also gave a cautious welcome to biotechnology as a tool for increasing world food production. "If the environmental threats from biotechnology are addressed, and if the technology is affordable by and geared towards the needs of the poor and undernourished, genetically modified crop varieties could help to sustain farming in marginal areas and to restore degraded land to production."

The study predicted that future food production will shift further towards intensive industrial farming and warns this could threaten the livelihoods of the 675 million rural poor who depend on small-scale livestock farming. "If we do not take measures to correct the situation, the poor will be unable to compete on the food market." The study warned that "with many marine marine stocks now fully exploited or overexploited, future fish stocks are likely to be constrained".

It sought however to minimise the impact of global warming. "The overall effect of climate change on global food production by 2030 is likely to be small," the report said. The FAO study, the fifth of its kind, presents the organisation's latest analysis of long-term world trends in nutrition and agriculture and includes projections for 140 countries and 32 areas of food production and livestock rearing. - AFP