Sunday, January 29, 2023

REVISIT FOOD SECURITY IN MALAYSIA (PART 2)

FOOD SECURITY
exists when all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life as defined by World Food Summit, 1996). It consists of component such as Food availability: The availability of sufficient quantities of food of appropriate quality, supplied through domestic production or imports (including food aid). Food access: Access by individuals to adequate resources (entitlements) for acquiring appropriate foods for a nutritious diet. Entitlements are defined as the set of all commodity bundles over which a person can establish command given the legal, political, economic and social arrangements of the community in which they live (including traditional rights such as access to common resources). Food Utilization: Utilization of food through adequate diet, clean water, sanitation and health care to reach a state of nutritional well-being where all physiological needs are met. This brings out the importance of non-food inputs in food security. Food Stability: To be food secure, a population, household or individual must have access to adequate food at all times. They should not risk losing access to food as a consequence of sudden shocks (e.g. an economic or climatic crisis) or cyclical events (e.g. seasonal food insecurity). The concept of stability can therefore refer to both the availability and access dimensions of food security. This article in "Anim Agriculture Technology" I would like to rewrite about food security in Malaysia revisited.

A closer examination reveals that this indicator includes assessing whether the country's government has made food security a focus area and priority and has a clear food security strategy. Notably reported that for years, from 2012 to 2020, Malaysia has been receiving a zero score on this measure from food security experts. For the same period, from 2012 to date, the experts have also been highly sceptical of the Malaysian government's ability to be held responsible and accountable for whether it has invested in and taken a coordinated approach to achieve food security. In GFSI 2021 Malaysia has finally received a score of 50 for food security and access policy commitment mainly due to the formation of a National Food Security Council. However, further analysis reveals this event did not change Malaysia's food security equation. Further examination into the current (successor) policy (NAP 2.0) clearly points to the underwhelming performance of its predecessor, NAP 1.0.

Malaysia experienced marginal improvements or even reductions in the self-sufficiency level (SSL) of major food items between 2010 to 2020. Most food items decreased (in red), while only three recorded growths (in black), which are all very marginal. Notably, rice SSL is below its 70 per cent SSL target in NAP 1.0, and some contractions in food item SSL appear contrary to its growth demand - pointing to higher dependency on imports. For example, milk experienced a significant SSL decrease despite being the highest consumption growth (11.61 per cent CAGR 2010-2020), and beef and mutton experienced significantly declining SSL despite significant consumption growth (4.14 per cent CAGR; 2010-2020), as reported in NAP 2.0. Between 2010 to 2020 Malaysia also experienced a declining share of agriculture GDP contribution, indicating a higher focus on other sectors and/or reduced reliance on agriculture for the Malaysian economy.

Note that the NAP 2.0 document shows the 2020 forecast figure, while DOSM reported that the contribution of the agriculture sector to Malaysia's GDP in 2020 is 7.4 per cent - slightly higher than the forecast. Of course, we recognise that Malaysia may experience further decline in agriculture GDP contribution due to logistics and export restriction measures during the lockdown periods. Be that as it may, in the background of marginal growth/contraction of SSL for major food items, increasing food demand can only be met by increasing imports. Especially when in presence of a declining share of agricultural GDP contribution, the reduced SSL reflects decreasing local production capacities for major food items. Fair enough, the NAP 2.0 reported an increasing trade deficit between 2010 to 2020, and a widening production-consumption gap. Indeed, the policy document reported that the major agrofood consumption rate is more than the growth rate of the production, with the only exception of rice which saw a slightly declining local demand, and that consumption would likely surpass local production capacities should the trend continue. These indicate increasing reliance on imports to fulfil local demand and point to increased reliance on external supply chains to support the domestic needs of the agrofood sector. 
This article divided in 4 segmen that is Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 and Part 4 respectively. Thanks...

By,
M Anem,
Putrajaya,
Malaysia.
(January 2023).

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