The global hunger crisis

Tackling food insecurity in developing countries

Majda Bne Saad, Pluto Press, 312 pages, paperback, £21.99

Millions of people across the world face a daily challenge to find enough food to survive.

Hunger is on the rise globally, with more than 1.2 billion people suffering from food insecurity. Rising prices are further restricting food access. Majda Bne Saad, a lecturer in food security, famines and development management at University College Dublin before her retirement, identifies the causes for global hunger embedded in the current global political and economic system. And she highlights the key challenges facing food deficit countries.

She shows how Western countries share the blame for global hunger through their support for subsidies to agricultural production and biofuels, which have created new challenges to food security worldwide.

The book looks at the world system for producing food, access to land, control of water and the relationship between gender and food security. Bne Saad argues that, as the world population rises from 7 billion to 9.2 billion by 2050, there needs to be a “second green revolution” to grow more food.

She looks at the factors constraining low-income nations from achieving food security, and at policies which could enhance individuals’ entitlement to food.

Reviews contributed by the Bookmarks socialist bookshop. Order online at www.bookmarksbookshop.co.uk