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OCR for page 25
FOOD PRODUCTION, FoOD SUPPLY,
AND NUTRITIONAL STATUS*
John W. Mellor
Social, humanitarian, and economic concerns dictate
that the pressing problems of hunger and malnutrition in
the developing countries be solved. Although authori-
tative figures vary widely (see Poleman, 1981), the
National Research Council (1977) cited the FAG and World
Bank estimate of more than 450 million hungry or
malnourished people. - ~ ~
~, . . . . . . . . .
In my view, around a billion people
lack one standard or nutrition needed to support an
active, healthy life; most of them live in the developing
countries of Asia, Africa, and Latin America.
In most developing countries, productivity-increasing
technological change in agriculture is necessary for
solving chronic problems of hunger and malnutrition.
Preliminary results from research of the International
Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) in Malaysia,
India, and Africa (Kumar, 1981; Pinstrup-Andersen, 1985)
indicate a strong positive relationship between increased
food production and calorie consumption by the poor. A
recent major analysis of time-series data for India
showed that per capita food production and the price of
food are two of the dominant determinants of fluctuations
in rural poverty. Increases in per capita food produc-
tion and reductions in the price of food can be achieved
only through cost-reducing technological change in
agriculture (Mellor and Desai, 1985~. This close
relation between food production and poverty means that
it is necessary to understand the dynamics of food
production growth if one is to understand changes in
nutritional status.
To set the more general framework for analyzing these
issues, a review of recent trends in population, food
production, and trade in the Third World is needed,
together with an examination of the prospects for food
production and consumption in various areas of the Third
World. On the basis of those data, we can discuss the
need for an agricultural strategy of development in the
*The assistance of several colleagues at the Interna-
tional Food Policy Institute, particularly Richard H.
Adams, Jr., is acknowledged.
25
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26
Third World and the impact of such a strategy on the
rural and urban poor
.
PAST ADS IN POPUIATION AND FOOD PRODUCTION
IN THE THIRD WORLD
1
Between 1961 and 1980, food production in the
developing world increased at an annual average of 2.6%
(Table 1), only slightly faster than the average annual
population growth of 2.5~. Thus, on a per capita basis,
food production in the Third World as a whole increased
by only 0.1% per year. However, this aggregate figure
covers sharply different rates of food production growth
in various regions. For example, in Asia, an area that
was once considered famine prone, per capita food
production increased by 0.4% per year, but in sub-Sahara
Africa, the new food-deficit area, per capita food
production fell by a shocking 1.1% per year.
The sharp decline in food production in sub-Sahara
Africa commands our immediate attention. On the one
hand, the roots of this food crisis in Africa go back a
long way, to include such factors as a series of poor
crop years, low government investment in agriculture,
and unfavorable public agricultural policies (see Mellor
et al., in press; Eicher, 1982~. On the other hand, the
crisis includes the notable absence of any proven tech-
nological packages for small farmers in most of the rain-
fed farming systems of Africa. The new seed-fertilizer
technologies commonly associated with the green revolu-
tion have only barely touched Africa; the principal green
revolution crops, wheat and rice, have not been staple
food crops in Africa (Etcher, 1982~.
l
According to Table 1, consumption growth outraced
production in all the major areas of the developing
world. In sub-sahara Africa and in North Africa and the
Middle East, the rate of growth of consumption greatly
exceeded that of production. Yet in these two regions,
the large flow of imports from the developed world
actually helped to raise consumption. Only in sub-Sahara
Africa have recent agricultural years been so poor that
even massive imports of food have been unable to stave
off a decline in per capita consumption. Net imports of
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27
cereals to the developing countries (excluding China)
rose from 14 million tons in the late 1960s to nearly
50 million tons in the early 1980s. For sub-Sahara
Africa, the increase was from 1.5 to 8.5 million tons.
In the Third World, two principal forces tend to fuel
a steady rise in food consumption: population growth and
TABLE 1 Growth in Population and in Production and
Consumption of Major Food Crops in the Developing
Worlda
Average Annual Average Annual
Growth Rate in Growth Rate in
Average Annual Production of Consumption of
Growth Rate Major brood Major Food
Country in Population, Crops, Crops,b
Group 1961-1980, % 1961-1980. % 1966-1980. %
Devel°Pincg 2.5 2.6 3.0
countries
Asia 2.4 2.8 3.0
(excluding
China)
North Africa 2.7 2.5 3.9
and Middle
East
Sub-Sahara 2.8 1.7 2.2
Africa
Latin America 2.6 2.8 3.1
aReprinted with permission from Paulino (1986~.
bIncludes cereals, roots and tubers, pulses, groundnuts,
bananas, and plaintains. Rice is in husked form at 80%
of unhusked paddy.
CIncludes 104 Asian, African, Middle Eastern, and Latin
American countries. People's Republic of China not in-
cluded, because of lack of consistent consumption data
for the period covered.
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28
per capita income growth. The manner in which these two
dynamic forces interact is illustrated in Table 2, which
depicts five stylized phases of food demand and economic
growth.
The first row of the table shows an early stage of
economic growth in which people are very poor, desperately
wishing to consume more food, yet unable to do so because
of low incomes. In this stage, poverty causes high death
rates and hence only modest rates of population growth.
TABLE 2 Hypothetical Comparison of Growth in Demand for
Agricultural Commodities at Different Stages of
Developmenta
Propor
tion of Rate of Rate of Income
Level Popula- Popula- Per Elasti- Rate of
of tion in tion Capita city Growth in
Devel- Agricul- Growth, Income, of Demand,C
opment sure, % % % Growth Demandb %
Very 70 2.5 0.5 1.0 3.0
ow
income
Low 60 3.0 1.0 0.9 3.9
income
Medium
income
High
income
Very
high
income
50 2.5 4.0 0.7 5.3
30 2.0 4.0 0.5 4.0
10 1.0 3.0 0.1 1.3
-
aAdapted from Mellor (1966).
bPercent increase in demand for each 1% increase in per
capita income.
CSum of population growth rate and the product of per
capita income growth rate and income elasticity.
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29
The result is a 3% or less growth rate in the effective
demand for food--a rate that can be met by more effort on
- slightly expanded land base.
As development occurs, the population growth rate
increases; even more important, income begins to grow
rapidly. The two together increase the growth rate of
demand for food by some 30% over that in the earlier
phase (see the third row of Table 2~. Such a rate of
growth in food demand exceeds all but the highest rates
of food production growth. Thus, a high rate of
technological change in agriculture is needed in this
stage of development (row 3 of Table 2~.
However, even the countries with the most impres-
sive rates of technological change in agriculture have
recently been unable to keep up with growth in food
demand. For example, the 16 developing countries with
the highest growth rates in production of basic food
staples in the period 1961-1976 collectively more than
doubled their net food imports during the period (Bachman
and Paulino, 1979~. Most countries in the high-growth-
rate, medium-income stage of development find it
necessary to rely on food imports to meet their surging
food demand.
In the later stages of development, population growth
rates decline, and growth in income has less effect on
the demand for food. Meeting food demand then becomes
more manageable, particularly because high rates of
growth in food production have become institutionalized.
Food imports becomes unnecessary, and agricultural
surpluses begin to accrue.
In the modern Third World, many developing countries
are currently in the high-growth-rate, medium-income
stage of development. They therefore depend heavily on
food imports to meet their food needs. According to
Table 3, between the periods 1961-1965 and 1973-1977, net
food imports by the Third World increased by a factor of
4.3, from 5.3 to 23 million tons per year. They have
since doubled.
A close reading of the data in Table-3 suggests that
increasing per capita income is the dynamic factor
underlying the surge in food imports in the Third World.
For example, in the table, countries with the highest
rate of per capita growth in gross national product
experienced a 6.6% annual growth in food imports between
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30
TABLE 3 Net Imports and Growth Rates for Imports and
Exports of Food Staples in Developing Countries, 1961-
1965 and 1973 - 1977 and Projections of New Imports to
Cocoa
Country
Group
Developing
countries
Net Imports
per Year,
Millions of Tons b
1961- 65 1973 - 77 2000
5.3 23.0 80.3 2.1
Annual Growth Rate,
1961-65 to- 1969-73 %
Exports Imports
5.4
Y cg
Asia 6.3 10.9 -17.9 2.5 3.5
North
America and
Middle East 3.6 10.6 57.3 - 2.0 7.3
Sub-Sahara
Africa -0.9 2.9 35.5 -4.6 7.1
Latin
America -3.7 -1.4 5.4 3.6 6.9
By GNP per
capita
growth rate:
<1.0% 1.6 8.0 39.5 -5.1 7.7
1.0-2.9% 2.8 -1.1 -48.5 1.8 3.3
3.0-4.9% 1.7 4.0 24.1 4.8 5.5
>5.0% 4.7 12.1 65.2 2.9 6.6
aPersonal communication, Paulino et al., International
Food Policy Institute.
bProjections are based on differences between extra-
polations of 1961- 1977 country trends in production and
aggregate projections of demand for food, animal feed,
and other uses; projections of demand for animal feed
were assumed to follow country growth rates of meat
consumption, i.e., no change in feeding efficiency. A
basis for this assumption is being pursued at Interna-
tional Food Policy Research Institute, but results are
not yet available.
CExcluding People's Republic of China.
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31
1961-1965 and 1969-1973. The countries in the next
highest growth category also had a high rate of increase
in food imports, more than doubling their imports from
the first to the second period. The only exception to
this finding is the slowest-growth countries (less than
1.0% per capita increase in GNP), many of which are in
sub-Sahara Africa. On the whole, the magnitude of food
imports by these countries reflects the impact of food
aid and assistance programs. During the period 1976-
1978, these slowest-growth countries received about 35%
of their total cereal imports from food aid (Huddleston,
1984).
FOOD PRODUCTION AND CONSUMPTION PROJECTIONS
TO THE YEAR 2000
~V
On the basis of a straight-line projection, by
country, of 1961-1980 production data, food production
in the developing world is projected to increase at an
average annual rate of 2.9% between 1980 and 2000
(Table 4~. That is slightly faster than the United
Nations projection of an average annual increase of
2.1%. On a per capita basis, food production in the
Third World as a whole is projected to grow at 1.0% a
year between 1980 and 2000. This impressive aggregate
figure covers widely different rates of food production
growth in various regions. For example, in Asia per
capita food production is projected to increase at an
average annual rate of 1.4%, and in sub-Sahara Africa per
capita food production is projected to fall by 1.2% per
year.
With respect to consumption, if present trends in per
J
capita income growth continue, the consumption of major
food crops in the developing world as a whole is pro-
iected to increase at an average annual rate of 2.7% from
1980 to 2000 (Table 41--nearly as fast as the production
of these commodities. Among the regions, the projected
growth of food consumption is slowest in Asia: 2.3% a
year. Annual consumption growth in Asia would be about
0.6% slower than the increase in food output, but signi-
ficantly faster than population growth. In sub-Sahara
Africa, food consumption is projected to grow at the
fairly high rate of 3.6% a year, which would be over
1.0% a year faster than production.
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32
TABLE 4 Projected Growth Rates of Population and
Consumption of Major Food Crops in the Developing World,
1980-2000a
Projected
Average
Annual Growth
Rate in
Population,
1980-2000 %
1.9
Country
Group
Developing
countries
Projected
Average
Annual Growth
Rate in
Production of
i b
Crops,
1980-2000
2.9
Projected
Average
Annual Growth
Rate in
Consumption of
i ~ c
Crops, '
1980-2000
2.7
Asia
(including
China)
North Africa
and Middle
East
1.5
2.7
Sub-Sahara 3.3
Africa
Latin
America
2.9
2.9
2.1
2.1
3.0
2.3
3.8
3.6
3.2
aReprinted with permission from Paulino (1986~.
bIncludes cereals, roots and tubers, pulses, ground-
nuts, bananas, and plaintains. Rice is in terms of
milled form and thus excludes rice bran.
CBased on 1977 trend estimates and 2000 projects of
trend income growth.
dIncludes 105 Asian, African, Middle Eastern, and
Latin American countries. People's Republic of China
included.
What caveats should we have in mind in using such
simple projections based on past food production and
consumption? First, the base period for consumption
estimates (1966-1980) was one of unusually rapid income
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33
growth in many developing countries.
Extrapolation from
that period therefore assumes that rapid income (and
economic) growth will reassert itself in the near
future. The current view on this point is ~ener~llv
pessimistic. The slowdown in world trade and the
overcharge of debit make it difficult for the nascent
potentials for increased productivity from research
successes to assert themselves.
Second, for the least developed countries, this base
period was one of rapid growth in foreign aid, which
sustained food consumption in otherwise retrogressing
economies .
Third, there are signs that major countries with a
potential to increase the rate of growth of demand, in
contrast with the fast-growth countries of the 1960s and
1970s, are misallocating their capital sufficiently to
cause demand for food to grow more slowly than supply.
Given the technological potential of the 1980s and l990s,
it appears that the developed countries will be able to
meet the increasing import needs that inevitably
accompany increased economic growth in the developing
world.
STRATEGIES OF ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT:
Given the key role of agricultural production in
reducing poverty and improving nutrition, it is useful to
examine the outlines of an agricultural strategy of
development. Such a strategy can best be distinguished
by reference to other strategies of economic development.
In the 1960s, much attention was given to the
so-called capital-intensive strategies of development.
These strategies, which may be typified by reference to
G. S. Feldman (Mellor, 1976), the intellectual father of
the growth strategy of the Soviet Union, focus on the
production of capital goods. In such a strategy, the
great bulk of resources is channeled to large-scale
industries--notably steel and machine-building--that
maximize capital formation and economic growth. The
diversion of capital resources into agriculture and
production of consumer goods is actively discouraged in
the short run, so as to maximize long-term industrial
growth. A capital-intensive strategy of development thus
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34
places little emphasis in the short term on improving
agricultural production or the nutritional status of the
poor. Over the long term, these problems are supposed to
be solved by the massive growth in capital investment in
factories and machines that is to take place.
The inability of any capital-intensive strategy of'
development to produce economic growth with equity has
prompted renewed interest in an agricultural strategy of
development (see Mellor, 1966; Mellor and Johnston,
1984~. Such a strategy has three basic characteristics:
it emphasizes the production of consumer goods, espe-
cially food; it emphasizes increased employment, with
respect to both labor supply and labor demand; and it
emphasizes international trade and comparative advan-
tage. Each of these characteristics has important
implications for the pattern and pace of food production
growth, and each constitutes a sharp contradiction of a
capital-intensive strategy of development. Emphasis on
consumer goods is central to an agricultural strategy,
because agriculture is basically an industry that pro-
vides consumer goods. But several other features need to
be stressed.
First, food and employment are two sides of the same
coin. As shown in Table 5, budget shares for food among
the poor range between 47% and 79%. A high-employment
policy creates a large increase in the demand for food.
If more food is not forthcoming, food prices will rise,
the real cost of labor will increase, and investment will
swing to more capital-intensive processes (Mellor,
1976~. Thus, any strategy of development that entails
labor mobilization will also require the wage goods--
particularly food--to support economic growth.
Second, by stimulating the growth of employment
opportunities for the poor, an agricultural strategy of
development also increases the ability of the poor to buy
food. Technological change in agriculture increases the
income of land-owning farmers, who spend a large propor-
tion of their new income on a wide range of goods and
services. Studies in Asia (e.g., Bell and Hazell, 1980;
Hazell and Roell, 1983) have suggested that typically 40%
of increments in income of farmers is spent on locally
produced nonagricultural goods and services. This
expenditure helps to provide new income and employment
opportunities for the poor, because it focuses on such
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35
TABLE 5 Budget Shares Spent on Food among the Poor in
Selected Cities and Countriesa
City/
Country
Bogota/ Lowest 25%
Colombia
Barranguilla/ Lowest 25%
Low-Income
Population Budget
Group Share, %
Reference
Musgrove (1979)
59
65
Musgrove (1979)
Colombia
Cali/ Lowest 25% 68 Musgrove (1979)
Colombia
Caracas/ Lowest 25% 47 Musgrove (1979)
Venezuela
Maracaibo/ Lowest 25% 58 Musgrove (1979)
Venezuela
Brazil, Lowest 30% 51 Gray (1982)
urban
Brazil, Lowest 30% 65 Gray (1982)
rural
India Lowest 20% 71 Mellor (1978)
Sri Lanka Lowest 10% 79 Sahn (unpublished)
Thailand Lowest 10% 67 Trairatvorakul (1984)
aReprinted with permission from Pinstrup-Andersen
(1985).
labor-intensive sectors as local transport, consumer
services, health, and housing. It also helps to build
the type of small-scale industry that stimulates further
rural growth and development.
Third, an agricultural strategy of development helps
to produce the export goods needed to fuel the develop-
ment process. To succeed, a development strategy
requires the importation of large quantities of capital-
intensive goods--for example, fertilizer and pesticides
for agriculture and steel and petrochemicals for indus-
try. In most developing countries, such imports must be
paid for through increased exports. An agricultural
strategy of development, which stresses the increased
production of agricultural and labor-intensive goods,
helps to supply goods for export.
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36
AGRICULTURAL DEVE=P~ ~ ME ~ITION~
STATUS OF WE POOR
In most developing countries, an agricultural
strategy of development is an important--but not
necessarily sufficient--means of improving the nutri-
tional status of the poor. Changes in total food
supplies affect their nutritional status only to the
extent that their food consumption is directly affected.
In many developing countries, calorie-protein deficien-
cies might well exist in the presence of plentiful food.
Thus, efforts to increase total food output should be
coupled to attempts to determine how they will affect the
nutritional status of various types of consumers.
During the last 15 years, urban consumers in many
developing countries have benefited greatly from tech-
nological efforts to increase food production (Pinstrup-
Andersen, 1985~. Much of the economic surplus generated
by new high-yield seeds and fertilizers has gone to urban
consumers in the form of cheaper and more plentiful
food. The effect of these efforts has sometimes been
magnified by trade and pricing policies that ensure the
flow of low-priced food staples to urban consumers.
However, the extent to which the poor and the malnour-
ished have shared in these consumer gains is not clear.
On the one hand, it appears that the absolute gain
obtained by low-income consumers was smaller than that
obtained by higher-income consumers. On the other hand,
if expressed as a percentage of current income, the gains
were larger for the poor (Hayami and Herdt, 1977;
Pinstrup-Andersen, 1977~. The reason is that the poor
tend to spend a smaller total amount, but a larger
percentage of their income on food.
One of the problems involved in assessing the impact
of technologic change in agriculture on the poor is
related to the makeup of their diets. Contrary to what
might be expected, the poor tend to spend a substantial
percentage of their food money on relatively expensive
calorie sources. For example, it is not unusual for the
urban poor in Latin America to spend more on meat than on
any other commodity. Musgrove (1979) found that meat
expenditures exceeded cereal expenditures among the
poorest quartile of the population in 5 of 10 Latin
American cities surveyed.
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37
Relatively little research has been done on the
impact of technological change on nutritional status in
rural households. However, recent research at IFPRI has
indicated that such change--under the appropriate circum-
stances--can have a significant impact on the poor. For
~r ~ - - ~
V - _
instance, in the Muda region of Malaysia, the introduc-
tion of high-yield seeds and fertilizer led rice yields
to increase from 700 to 1,200 kg/hectare (Pinstrup-
Andersen, 1985~. As a result, expenditures on food
increased by 10%, and consumption of home-grown rice
increased by 15%. Total calorie consumption by all the
households in the region rose by 7%. Even more impor-
tant, calorie consumption by the poorest 30% of the
households increased by 14%. Improvements in protein
consumption were equally impressive. In Muda, the number
of households with protein consumption below the recom-
mended daily allowance fell from 16% to 3.4%, for a
reduction of about 80%.
CONCLUSIONS
Protein-calorie deficiencies are widespread in many
Asian, African, and Latin American countries. Absolute
poverty, poor health, and lack of knowledge of nutrition
are among the principal reasons for the high prevalence
of malnutrition.
Under these circumstances, most developing coun-
tries would be well-advised to pursue an agricultural
strategy of development. Technological change in
agriculture is often an important, but not necessarily
sufficient, condition for solving the problems of hunger
and malnutrition in the developing world by not only
increasing the total amount of food available to mal-
nourished groups, but also helping to increase their
ability to purchase food. Through direct and indirect
multiplier effects, technological change in agriculture
helps to increase the purchasing power of the poor by
supporting the creation of new employment opportunities
in a variety of labor-intensive sectors (e.g., agri-
culture, trade, and transport).
In the short run, growth in technology might not be
sufficient to meet the immediate needs of nutritionally
disadvantaged groups, and specific efforts might be
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38
needed to increase the availability of food and the
ability of poor households to obtain it. These efforts
might include attempts to reduce the price of food
commodities to malnourished groups (e g., food subsidy.
programs) and efforts to increase their purchasing
power (e.g., food-for-work programs). The pursuit of
such efforts will require developing countries to
increase their attention to nutritional goals and objec-
tives. Policy decisions, for example, must consider the
types of people in greatest nutritional need and the
policy instruments that are most appropriate for aiding
them.
The developed countries have a critical role to play
in ensuring the success of nutritional policies in the
Third World. Food aid and imports are often essential
for the creation of effective food-for-work and food
subsidy programs. The developed countries have the funds
and the technical expertise to assist developing
countries in pursuing a long-term strategy of techno-
logical change in agriculture. Such assistance by the
more mature economies can help to relieve the onerous
problems of malnutrition and food deprivation in the
Third World. Hunger is an affront to the dignity of all
mankind, particularly if we have the means to prevent it.
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DISCUSSION OF DR. MELLOR'S PAPER
DR. GARZA: With respect to technological break-
throughs, we seem to be at a crossroads in agricultural
policy and nutrition in this country. What do you think
developed countries should do to maximize the benefits of
these breakthroughs for developing countries? There is a
greater potential than ever before to widen or narrow the
production gap between developed and developing coun-
tries, if we realize the full promise of these techno-
logic breakthroughs. It might be useful to ask what we
should do, rather than what the developing countries
should do, to maximize the benefits of new technologies.
DR. MELLOR: The principal thing we can do is to help
them build a modern basis for applying scientific
HA" T - ~ - ;~ Thai ~ .^.~ ~.^.11~=
~=V I 1~& =~1~ ~ ~ ~ in,& ~_~,^__~ . This requires that
national agricultural research systems be developed. The
stronger the national agricultural research system, the
greater the speed with which basic science can be
borrowed and strategic science can be adapted from other
countries. National systems of this kind require higher
education, and the process can be accelerated by
assistance with institutional development. We always
comment that developing countries have to do most of it
themselves; here we are talking about what we can do
around the periphery This is very critical, and it is
going to become much more critical over the next decade.
There has been considerable anti-elitism in the world
over the last decade with respect to developing coun
_
tries; but it is the countries which have been somewhat
elitist, in the sense of developing a large cadre of
highly trained people, that have been able to implement
the more personnel-intensive projects needed to reach the
poorest people. From the point of view of the poorest
people, more trained personnel are needed.
It might be useful to compare Africa and Asia.
Training of personnel has been extensive in many parts
of Asia. We are now seeing a tremendous range of
programs reaching the countryside in Asia and an increase
in emphasis on reaching the poorest people. Africa does
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to
problem appears to require increased labor productivity
more than land productivity. However, it can be shown
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that labor productivity in Africa cannot be raised
without raising land productivity, in terms of yield per
acre. Thus, even in Africa, the problem is to apply
modern science and technology to increase crop yields.
DR. GALDI: I am puzzled as to why this discussion has
emphasized production, rather than consumption. Over the
world as a whole, it is evidence that there is-sufficient
food, in the form of vegetable products. Use of meat is
costly and wasteful. What should the policy be in the
Third World to press for the importance of nonmeat diets?
DR. MELLOR: The reason I have emphasized production
is that I am talking about a strategy in which
agriculture is central, and production puts income into
the hands of many people. The purchasing power of the
majority of the rural people in Asia and Africa cannot be
raised unless their productivity--which is primarily
agricultural--is increased. Increasing nutritional
status will require improving incomes of the lowest
socioeconomic groups and increasing their production.
The critical view of livestock consumption is derived
from the United States. Livestock production in Asia,
by contrast, tends to be very labor-intensive; in the
Gujarat state in India, almost without exception, pro-
ducers are very poor women. You have to think about what
you are doing to increase purchasing power when you
increase demand for milk by higher-income people.
My impression is that nutritionists are again
recognizing that there are problems in trying to meeting
dietary needs entirely from vegetable sources, or even
entirely from carbohydrate sources. There is a problem
in raising the fat content, in view of the difficulty of
ensuring sufficient caloric requirements. We are seeing
the wisdom of consumption of at least a small amount of
animal protein, and that small amount is probably
somewhere near the Taiwanese consumption, but not the
U.S. consumption. We need to consider where the
developing countries are today; their problem is related
to production more than you might think.
Representative terms from entire chapter:
third world