Current World Food Situation

Excerpts from the report: World output of food products in 1966 resumed the long-term uptrend, increasing about 4 percent (excluding Mainland China), compared to the world population increase of about 2 percent. Principal gains in world agriculture in 1966 were among the food commodities--new production records were set for cereals, edible oilseeds, and sugar. The gain in the output of livestock food products almost matched the gain in population. There was a large decline in world output of coffee. During the past decade, food production has increased at a faster rate in the less-developed countries than in the developed countries, but the per capita trend in the less-developed countries has been dampened by a high rate of population growth. In the past decade there was some improvement in per capita food production in India until the severe drought of 1965. In 1966, per capita production recovered somewhat from the extremely low 1965 level. However, food shortages continue in India because of stock depletion and crop failure in several localities. Per capita food production in other less-developed countries of Asia in 1966 continued the general uptrend of the past decade. Drought, tribal conflict, and widespread political instability caused a decline in per capita production in the less-developed countries of Africa for the third year in a row. Largely because of drought and poor harvest weather, per capita food production fell in Latin America in 1966, following a period of improvement during 1961-65.