August 27, 2006	Sunday	Sha'aban 2, 1427

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ISLAMABAD, Aug 26: South Asian states continue to degrade human security in the region by diverting resources towards defence to fight conflicts within and without, according to a development study done by the Mahbubul Haq Human Development Centre (MHHDC).

“National security is a meaningless concept in absence of human security,” the centre said in its ninth annual report, pointing out that over 300 million South Asians are chronically malnourished.

While focusing on food insecurity, the report explores how policies regarding distribution of economic growth, health spending, environmental preservation, women and child rights and democratic governance are directly linked to human security.

It says the food inflation rate in Pakistan currently stands at seven per cent and warns that the upward trend of prices has “grave consequences” for the food security of the masses.

“In the larger South Asian context, food security stands threatened for all by a shrinking natural resource base due to the burgeoning population and the ever-increasing pressures of urbanisation,” says the report.

At present about 40 per cent of the 815 million food insecure people in the developing world live in South Asia.

“This is not all. There are tens of thousands others in the low-income group who constantly live under the threat of food insecurity. Any sudden dip in income, production shortfall pushes these individuals to the very brink of food insecurity,” says the report.

MHHDC analysts found that food insecurity in the region was mostly related to low access rather than low availability of food. “Well above half the consumption expenditure in South Asia is reserved for food items. However, due to the high incidence of poverty, millions lack the purchasing power to access food,” they said.

Despite increased food availability, severe inequality in land and income distribution prevents the poor from meeting their minimum daily nutritional requirement, according to the report.

It says: “The highly skewed asset-distribution in most South Asian countries is by far the critical factor negatively affecting food security”.

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