“Squeezed” is the first of four annual reports that will assess the impact of
high and volatile food prices on the well-being of urban and rural communities
in ten countries: Bangladesh, Bolivia, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Guatemala,
Indonesia, Kenya, Pakistan, Vietnam and Zambia
“Dramatic changes in the workforce occur as people are forced out of
agriculture into riskier but better paid occupations, such as mining or
prostitution,” said the report made available to The Jakarta Post on Friday.
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The study of rural and urban consumers in Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Kenya,
Bangladesh, Guatemala, Zambia, Bolivia, Indonesia, Pakistan and Vietnam found
that the failure of wages to keep pace with rising food prices is putting
immense strain on families and communities, with increased levels of domestic
violence, and alcohol and drug abuse.
“Many people are earning more, but this is often illusory: wage rises rarely
match rises in the cost of living. People have to cope in time-honoured ways by
cutting back, substituting, shopping around, and growing and gathering more. The
impacts are felt in homes, relationships, communities and work places, changing
the way people think about themselves and others,” say the authors.
“High and rising food prices no longer come as a surprise, but rapid price
changes and the cumulative effects of five years’ worth of price rises are still
squeezing those on low incomes. People are working harder over longer hours and
their wages are not keeping pace with inflation, so they are having to adapt
wherever, and however, possible.”
“Poor people across the globe are feeling the strain in this era of high
and volatile food prices – from the nurses in Zambia who are forced to moonlight
as street vendors to make ends meet, to low-income households in the UK who are
borrowing money, dipping into savings or turning to food banks to have enough to
eat,” says Oxfam’s policy researcher, Richard King.
Latest estimates suggest that one in eight of the world’s population suffer
from undernourishment and that nearly one in five face food “inadequacy”. While
improvements have continued in Latin America and the Caribbean, and in Asia and
the Pacific, reductions in hunger in sub-Saharan Africa have slowed, and the
number of undernourished people in Africa and the Middle East has continued to
increase.
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