There has been much excitement in Pakistan and noise and clamor in India over its ranking in the Global Hunger Index 2022 where it ranked 107 out of 121 countries- lower than all South Asian economies except Afghanistan. Pakistan (99), Bangladesh (84), Nepal (81) and Sri Lanka (64) all fared better than India. India also had a child-wasting rate of over 19 percent – the highest in the world. The authorities claim that the rankings are based on ‘erroneous measure of hunger” and “serious methodological issues”.
However, India’s ranking does not change the fact that Pakistan also ranks among those categorized to have ‘serious’ level of hunger in the country in the 2022 Global Hunger Index, ranking at 99th out of the 121 countries. The Global Hunger Index (GHI) measures and tracks hunger at global, regional, and national levels under four parameters: undernourishment, child stunting, child wasting, and child mortality. As per the latest report, South Asia is one of the regions with the world's highest hunger level, highest child stunting rate and the highest child wasting rate in the world.
Though Pakistan has seen its overall score fall from 29.6 in 2014 to 26 in 2022 (higher score being extremely alarming situation), prevalence of undernourishment has actually increased from 13.4 percent in 2014 to 16.9 percent in 2022. Moreover, where child stunting, child wasting and infant mortality stats have improved, India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan each still have child stunting rates between 35 and 38 percent, with Afghanistan's rate being the highest in the region. Moreover, the situation this year is only going to get worse for the region due to the unrest in Afghanistan, political turmoil in Sri Lanka, and political uncertainty and recent record-breaking floods in Pakistan that will deteriorate food security situation and child health among the millions of flood affectees.
The Global Hunger Index has also warned that the world continues to face a setback in efforts to combat hunger due to the climate crisis, economic repercussions of the pandemic and the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war amid rising prices and food shortages around the world.
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