{"id":86916,"date":"2026-10-16T18:30:18","date_gmt":"2026-10-16T13:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/?p=86916"},"modified":"2026-10-16T18:30:56","modified_gmt":"2026-10-16T13:00:56","slug":"world-food-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/16-10-2026\/world-food-day","title":{"rendered":"World Food Day 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Syllabus: GS3\/ Food Security<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Context<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The Ministry of Agriculture (MoA), in collaboration with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) celebrated<strong> World Food Day 2026.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>About<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>World Food Day is observed every year on <strong>16 October<\/strong> to mark the founding of the <strong>Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO)<\/strong> of the <strong>United Nations in 1945.\u00a0<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The day was established to draw attention to the <strong>persistent problem of hunger and the need to make food security a shared priority.<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Theme for 2026: <\/strong>\u201cInnovate today. Nourish tomorrow.\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Food Security Concern (SOFI 2026)<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Global Scenario:<\/strong> As per the State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI) 2026, an estimated 7.8% of the global population faced hunger in 2025, down from 8.1% in 2024 and 8.6% in 2022.\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Indian Scenario:\u00a0<\/strong>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Undernourished Population:<\/strong> Undernourishment fell to 142.5 million people (9.8% of the population) in 2023\u20132025, down from 243.9 million (21.1%) in 2004\u20132006.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Healthy Diet Cost: <\/strong>The cost of a healthy diet reached PPP $4.11 per person per day in 2025, a nearly 48% increase since 2017.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Affordability Crisis:<\/strong> Around 520.1 million people (35.5% of India\u2019s population) could not afford a healthy diet in 2025.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Malnutrition Indicators: <\/strong>Child stunting declined to 32.9% and wasting stood at 18.7%, while childhood overweight, adult obesity, and women\u2019s anaemia continued to rise.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Major Challenges to Global Food Security<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Climate change:<\/strong> Extreme weather events, changing rainfall patterns and rising temperatures reduce agricultural yields and disrupt growing seasons.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Conflict and wars: <\/strong>Conflicts destroy crops, displace farmers, disrupt food supply chains and weaken institutions responsible for food distribution.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>High Cost of Nutritious Food:<\/strong> Rising prices of fruits, vegetables, pulses, milk and protein-rich foods.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Income Constraints: <\/strong>Many households prioritize inexpensive calorie-rich staples over diverse diets.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Dietary Imbalance:<\/strong> Excess dependence on cereals with inadequate intake of proteins and micronutrients.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Poor Maternal Nutrition:<\/strong> High prevalence of anaemia contributes to intergenerational malnutrition.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Regional and Social Inequalities: <\/strong>Tribal areas, remote regions and urban poor continue to face higher nutritional vulnerabilities.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Changing Food Consumption Patterns: <\/strong>Increasing consumption of ultra-processed foods has contributed to rising obesity.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>India&#8217;s Journey from Food Scarcity to Surplus<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Green Revolution:<\/strong> The introduction of high-yielding crop varieties, expanded irrigation and assured prices significantly increased cereal production.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Public Distribution System (PDS):<\/strong> Increased foodgrain production created the foundation for large-scale food distribution and nutrition programmes.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Food surplus:<\/strong> India has become one of the world&#8217;s largest producers of foodgrains, milk, pulses, fruits and vegetables.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>India&#8217;s Food Security Framework<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>National Food Security Act (NFSA), 2013:<\/strong> Provides legal entitlements to subsidised foodgrains for up to 75% of the rural population and 50% of the urban population, covering approximately 81 crore people.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana (PMGKAY): <\/strong>Free foodgrains have been provided to eligible beneficiaries since 2024, with the arrangement extended until 2028.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Targeted Public Distribution System (TPDS): <\/strong>Supports the distribution of foodgrains to eligible beneficiaries.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Digitisation: <\/strong>Digitised ration cards and Aadhaar seeding help improve the identification of beneficiaries and reduce leakages.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>One Nation One Ration Card (ONORC): <\/strong>Enables eligible beneficiaries, particularly migrant workers, to access their foodgrain entitlements from ration shops across the country.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Mid Day Meal Programme: <\/strong>The Programme aims to boost enrolment, retention, and attendance while improving the nutritional status of children in government, local body, and government-aided schools.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Food Fortification: <\/strong>The government promotes fortified rice, wheat flour, and edible oils as part of the public distribution system.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Poshan Tracker: <\/strong>The Ministry of Women and Child Development developed the Poshan Tracker ICT application as a key governance tool.\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>It uses WHO\u2019s expanded tables with day-based z-scores to dynamically assess stunting, wasting, underweight, and obesity in children based on height, weight, gender, and age.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>SakshamAnganwadi and Poshan 2.0 <\/strong>includes key schemes such as the POSHAN Abhiyaan, Anganwadi Services and Scheme for Adolescent Girls as direct targeted interventions to address the problem of malnutrition in the country.\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Way Ahead<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Promote production, supply and consumption of fruits, vegetables, pulses, millets and dairy products along with reducing post-harvest losses.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Public policies should focus on ensuring access to balanced, diverse and micronutrient-rich diets rather than only calorie sufficiency.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Expand iron-folic acid supplementation, improve maternal healthcare and promote dietary diversification to reduce anaemia.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Integrate nutrition education, physical activity promotion and regulation of unhealthy foods into public health policies.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Source: <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.thehindu.com\/opinion\/op-ed\/innovate-today-nourish-tomorrow-for-food-security\/article71589383.ece\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>TH<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><strong> Context <\/strong><\/p>\n<li class=\"ms-5\"> The Ministry of Agriculture (MoA), in collaboration with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) celebrated World Food Day 2026. <\/li>\n<p><\/p>\n<p><strong> About <\/strong><\/p>\n<li class=\"ms-5\"> World Food Day is observed every year on 16 October to mark the founding of the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations in 1945.\u00a0 <\/li>\n<li class=\"ms-5\"> The day was established to draw attention to the persistent problem of hunger and the need to make food security a shared priority. <\/li>\n<p><a href=\" https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/16-10-2026\/world-food-day \" class=\"btn btn-primary btn-sm float-end\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-86916","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-affairs"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86916","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=86916"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86916\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":86918,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86916\/revisions\/86918"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=86916"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=86916"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=86916"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}