International Food Security Assessment 2021-31

This report presents results from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), Economic Research Service’s (ERS) International Food Security Assessment (IFSA) analysis, which uses a demand-driven framework that evaluates consumer responsiveness to changes in prices and incomes for 76 low- and middle-income countries. Reflecting 2021’s anticipated lower income levels, despite anticipated growth for most countries, the number of food insecure people is estimated at 1.2 billion, almost 291 million higher than in 2020. A sharp increase in global food security was experienced in 2020, as compared to 2019, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Most of the additional food insecure people in 2021 are located in the Central and South Asia (64.1 percent or 186.8 million) sub-region—including India, which drives food security trends in the Asia region. While the Sub-Saharan Africa region is projected to account for 20.6 percent (60 million) of the additional food insecure population. The remaining additional 15.3 percent (44.7 million) food insecure people in 2021 are located in other Asian sub-regions, Latin America and the Caribbean, and North Africa. The prevalence of food insecurity in 2021 for the countries in the assessment is estimated at 30.8 percent of the overall population in the countries, an increase of 6.8 percentage points relative to the 2020 estimate. In 2031, the number of food insecure people is projected to decline from the 2021 estimate by 47.4 percent (637.7 million people), which is 14.0 percent of the projected population of the countries included in this assessment. Given the evolving nature of the impacts from the COVID-19 pandemic and the long-term effects on individual country economies, the estimation results presented in this report contain a high degree of uncertainty. It is important to note the projections do not consider the impacts of unknown future events—such as climate change, armed conflict, and political and economic instability.