Statistics Bureau, FAO undertaking food insecurity survey

Jun 07, 2022 News

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Kaieteur News – The Bureau of Statistics and the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) have collaborated to collect, analyse and disseminate data on the prevalence of food insecurity in Guyana.

This will be done at the individual and household levels, utilising the Food Insecurity Experience Scale (FIES) methodology, which will be incorporated into the Bureau’s Labour Force Survey.
The Kaieteur News only recently reported on a Caribbean COVID-19 Food Security and Livelihoods Impact Survey which was launched by the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) to rapidly gather data on impacts to livelihoods, food security and access to markets. The survey has shown that Guyanese are adopting negative measures to cope with the ongoing difficulties associated with accessing food. The survey was implemented by the World Food Programme with support from the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and four rounds of the survey have been completed since the beginning of the pandemic. It was reported that findings during the February 2022 survey highlighted that citizens are adopting negative coping strategies to make ends meet. “More people are skipping meals and eating less preferred foods compared to April 2020.” Lowest income households, it was said, were most likely to resort to negative coping strategies, with 94 percent reporting to have depleted savings, 64 percent reduced spending on other essential needs, and 52 percent sold their productive assets.
“Food insecurity has further increased since April 2020. It is estimated that 58 percent of respondents from Guyana are moderately or severely food insecure which is higher than the regional average,” the survey found. The lowest income households have the highest severe food insecurity rates. While 58 percent of respondents continue to be worried about getting COVID-19, another 35 percent of citizens are also increasingly worried about meeting their food and other essential needs.

Meanwhile, the Stats Bureau said that in the intended, it has taken a cost-effective approach to produce food insecurity statistics. The data collected will help Guyana to identify existing food insecurity, track progress towards global goals, and inform decision-making and humanitarian responses that can alleviate hunger, the States Bureau said in a release. Many countries across the world have adopted this methodology due to its simplicity and reliability to produce results using a set of eight questions about experiences related to food access. This methodology was developed by the FAO to measure the prevalence of food insecurity in a given population and this informs Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) indicator 2.1.2, which estimates the proportion of the population facing moderate or severe difficulties in accessing food.
According to Deputy Chief Statistician (Ag), Bureau of Statistics, Mrs. Vanessa Profitt, “the FIES survey module has been incorporated into the Labour Force Survey (LFS) for the second quarter of 2022. The inclusion of this module into the ongoing survey allows for the gathering of information useful for the assessment of Guyana’s progress towards achieving SDG 2 as well as to reveal the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on food access.”
Forty field staff from the Bureau were trained recently to utilise the FIES methodology to collect data. Also, the FAO provided twenty-five (25) android tablets to support the data collection exercise and will work with Statisticians at the Bureau to compute the indicators for Guyana for the first time.
FAO Statistician for the Caribbean, Maxime Luciéné noted that “the granular data of the FIES will not only allow a comprehensive understanding of the food insecurity situation of Guyana, but will offer to decision-makers an excellent opportunity to take targeted measures to combat food insecurity due to the difference between gender, ethnicity, region or rural versus urban areas.”
Meanwhile, FAO Representative in Guyana, Dr. Gillian Smith highlighted that Guyana is on an ambitious development pathway to transform the agriculture-food system, and food security coupled with resilient production systems are a vital part of this vision. “FAO has tremendous expertise in these areas and continues to provide technical support to Guyana to ensure access to safe and nutritious food for a healthy and empowered population,” she added.
Guyana has significantly advanced its food security and nutrition agenda by achieving the World Food Summit (1996) and Millennium Development Goals (2015) hunger targets. Further, the country continues to improve its standing through advocacy and implementation of CARICOMs Regional Food and Nutrition Security Action Plan and Twenty-five by 2025 Strategy – Reducing CARICOM’s Agri-food Imports.
While Guyana is self-sufficient in food, fish and meat, and food energy supply to meet the population’s recommended food energy requirements, there is need for improved access to nutritious food to achieve the goal of adequate food security. The implementation of the FIES is a pathway that places the country a step closer to realizing food systems transformation and the right to adequate food for its people, eventually marking a return to the position of “the breadbasket of the Caribbean”.
Reliable data on food and agriculture are key to understanding the level and severity of food insecurity in a country. According to the 2020 report on the State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World, SDG 2, which aims to end hunger and malnutrition in all its forms by 2030, has veered off course due to several drivers such as climate extremes, conflict, and the ongoing global COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, countries need high-quality data to measure their progress towards this goal. A 2021 regional overview of food security and nutrition showed that estimates revealed that 4 out of every 10 people in Latin America and the Caribbean – 267 million – experienced moderate or severe food insecurity in 2020, 60 million more than in 2019.

 

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