Poverty and food insecurity work hand in hand

The lack of enough food in the world today can be attributed to the level of poverty.

Food scarcity is indeed the trademark of poverty, as most people in the world today fall extremely below the minimum wage of their various countries. According to research, many people in the developing and under developed countries live below one dollar a day. Considering the rate at which prices of goods and services increase by the day, and the drifting away of people from blue collar jobs like agriculture to white collar jobs, the heat of the economy, in terms of food satisfaction, has never been friendly to people living in poverty, especially, those in extreme poverty.

The emergence of technology, education and the creation of jobs in this 21st Century has still not made way for food security in the world, but rather food insufficiency, because the financial situation of the people is not able to sustain them face the rapid development of the world. The situation has resulted in poverty lurking in the households of many people, of which the people of Ghana are no exception. In Ghana, the financial and economic situation is no different from other developing countries, and many people in Ghana, despite the minimum wage which is not even enough, still fall within the monthly salary GH¢50 – GH¢100. Employers of the various institutions do not give the minimum wage which the government has proposed, but all the same the amount given to employees wouldn't be a problem if the prices of goods and services do not increase by the second, making poverty rule the lives of people. Should employees be treated fairly in the labour field, then poverty will stop lurking in the lives of people, which will lead to the eradication of food scarcity in the world.

Food security and poverty in Ghana
The majority of Ghanaians fall in the poverty level, considering the definition of the United Nations Committee on Social, Economic and Cultural Rights, 2001. According to this committee '…poverty may be defined as a human condition characterised by sustained or chronic deprivation of the resources, capabilities, choices, security and power necessary for the enjoyment of an adequate standard of living, and other civil, cultural, economic, political and social rights'. According to statistics, about 51% of Ghana's poor population can mostly be found in the rural areas, and so far, the poorest region in the country are the Upper West, Upper East and North.

The poverty state of these regions has a direct impact on women and children, as women mostly are the caretakers of the household. They have to go through the plight of providing food on the table, despite the rate of food insecurity in the region. The poverty level in the rural areas always compels people from the rural towns to settle in the urban areas, which results in the urban areas being densely populated, putting pressure on the limited social ammonites, and the rural areas being sparsely populated, making it unable to find people to tap the resources over there.

The level of poverty in Ghana has resulted in many, especially, those in northern Ghana, to have limited access to food. In a research conducted by the Comprehensive Food Security and Vulnerability Analysis (CFSVA), it was discovered that in Ghana, solely on the basis of household food consumption, 5% of the population of 1.2 million people have limited access to sufficient and nutritious food for an active and healthy life. Food insecurity can be found mostly in the poorest regions, which are also areas most prone to adverse weather conditions such as floods and droughts, and have been affected by soaring food prices. All over the country, about 2 million people are vulnerable to becoming food insecure. In the rural areas of the Upper West, Upper East and Northern regions, 507,000 people were found to be vulnerable of becoming food insecure. Up to 1.5 million people vulnerable to food insecurity live in the rural areas and urban areas of the seven remaining regions, with the largest percentage in the Brong-Ahafo Region.

Poverty and food scarcity among women in northern Ghana

Research in Ghana has indicated that women spend a greater part of their income on food for their families than men. As most women spend their income on food, they sometimes prefer to be paid in kind, by taking foodstuff for their families as a form of payment after working on a farm. Considering the frequent increase in prices of food, it is deemed that accepting payment in cash might not be enough to buy the food they need from the market. Most women in northern Ghana prefer to sell their harvested Shea nuts for money, to solve the level of food insecurity in their various families. Thought it is a fast way of getting money to save their families, they tend to lose the chance of deriving much higher incomes, since they cannot turn the nut into butter to increase its value.

According to the World Food Summit in 1996, when all people at all times do not have physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food to meet their dietary needs and food preferences for an active healthy life, then indeed, the people are going through food insecurity. Food availability concerns food that is physically present in the area of concern, through all forms of domestic production, commercial import and food aid. For most people in northern Ghana, by avoiding the risk of food insecurity in their homes, they spend about 75% of their total income in achieving that. Despite this effort, the plague of poverty does not allow them to enjoy that for long. Northern Ghana finds it difficult to escape the plague of food scarcity, since it is the poorest region in the country.

Economic progress and its poverty effect on the people

According to statistics, the Ghanaian economy has grown at an average annual rate of 4.5 per cent over the past two decades. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth was 6.3 per cent in 2007. The agriculture sector, which contributed 34 per cent of GDP in 2007, remains the country's major engine of economic growth. The benefits of economic progress are dramatically evident in the fact that national poverty rates have been cut almost in half, from approximately 51.7 per cent in 1991-1992, to 28.5 per cent in 2005-2006. Poverty decreased by about 17 percentage points in urban areas, and by 24 points in rural areas. Ghana's growth and poverty reduction rates are probably the best achieved in all of sub-Saharan Africa over the past 15 years.

In spite of these statistics, which signify progress in the standard of living of the people, poverty never seems to leave their daily lives. People have to migrate every day for greener pastures, so as to escape from the scourge of food insecurity.

Conclusion
Poverty and food insecurity, in a way, can be eradicated, as one seems to be the result of the other, and one stone can be used to kill two birds in this sense, in such a way that if poverty is eradicated, then food insecurity will not have its traces in society. As money, they say, answers all things, food security is prevalent due to the inability of the people getting the deserved income for their labour, and some also being unemployed. If the government really, wants to eradicate food insecurity, then it must make the eradication of poverty its priority.

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