Every night, one out of seven people on the planet go to bed hungry. As the Covid-19 pandemic has exacerbated the poverty and hunger crisis...
Every night, one out of seven people on the planet go to bed hungry. As the Covid-19 pandemic has exacerbated the poverty and hunger crisis, the situation in India looks particularly grim. In the Global Hunger Index released last week, India slipped seven places to a rank of 101 from 94 in just year.
The index gives a score on a 100 point scale, where 0 indicates no hunger and 100 shows an “extremely alarming” situation. With a score of 27.5, the level of hunger in India is “serious”.
The index uses four major parameters for calculating the global score. These are undernourishment, child wasting (children under five who have low weight for their height), child stunting (children under five with low height for their age) and child mortality (the rate of mortality for children under five).
The trend of these indicators for India over the years is seen in the chart below.
India has been ranked highest in child wasting among all 116 countries, reflecting acute undernutrition among children under the age of five. The report estimates an increase in child wasting rising from 15.1% in 2010-2014 to 17.3% in 2016- 2020.
Child stunting has been categorised as very high at 34.7%. Meanwhile, the child mortality...
