Food subsidy, food security and hunger in India

This paper reviews the trend in government expenditure on food subsidy, and, examines the state of food security, poverty, malnutrition and hunger in India. While government expenditure on food subsidies, intended for food security, increased tremendously during 1991/92–2014/15, the problems of food in security, poverty and malnutrition have been persisting. The growth rate offood grains production has decelerated significantly with declining per capita net availability and rising prices of foodgrains. A declining trend in per capita intake of calorie and protein has also been observed with an increasing trend in per capita intake of fat. India has the largest number of under nourished people in the world. Its Global Hunger Index score is higher than that ofmany sub-Saharan African counties. Until 2013, it remained in the category of countries with ‘alarming’ level of hunger, but managed to improve its status to ‘serious'category in 2014. The results suggest that priorities should be given to inclusive economic growth and targeted strategies to ensure food security in order to come out of chronic hunger and malnutrition. The focus should be on effective implementation of the food and nutritional security programmes through better governance and more efficient delivery system of public services.