CBSE Class 9 Social Science Food Security in India Notes Set 01

What Food Security Means

Food security means that all people can get enough safe and nutritious food at all times. It has three dimensions: availability (production, imports and government stocks), accessibility (food within reach of every person) and affordability (enough money to buy it).
The poor are the most vulnerable whenever production or distribution of food crops runs into trouble.

Why Food Security Is Needed

Rapid growth of population, a shift from cereals to cash crops, hoarding and black marketing, less land for farming, weak administration and natural calamities all threaten the food supply.
In a calamity such as drought, production falls, prices rise and the poor cannot buy food; a widespread and prolonged shortage may become famine.

Who Are Food Insecure and Types of Hunger

Landless households, traditional artisans, petty self-employed workers, destitutes, casual labourers, some social groups, migrants after disasters, and women, pregnant and nursing mothers and young children are most at risk. Backward states such as Bihar, Jharkhand, Orissa, West Bengal, Chhattisgarh, and parts of Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra have the largest numbers.
Chronic hunger comes from persistently poor diets and low income. Seasonal hunger comes from the cycle of farm work and casual labour.

Government Measures

After the Green Revolution, wheat and rice production rose and the country built a buffer stock. The FCI buys grain at a Minimum Support Price from surplus states and sells it through ration shops at the lower Issue Price. This is the public distribution system (PDS).
Ration cards are of three types: Antyodaya, BPL and APL. Other programmes include ICDS (1975), Food for Work (1977-78), the National Food for Work Programme (2004), the Antyodaya Anna Yojana (December 2000) and the Annapurna Scheme.
Problems of the PDS include costly storage of large stocks, wastage, and malpractices by dealers. Cooperatives such as those in Tamil Nadu, Amul in Gujarat and Mother Dairy in Delhi, and grain banks promoted by NGOs in Maharashtra also support food security.