Southeast Asia no longer has any poor country. Undoubtedly, poor people still number in the tens of millions in the region, but each ASEAN member country left the low-income classification years ago. In 2015, the World Bank reclassified Myanmar, thanks to a booming economy, from a low-income economy to a lower-middle income country. One out of only ten countries worldwide then to make the jump to middle-income status, Myanmar now joins neighbors like Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, the Philippines, and Vietnam. These countries have per-capita gross national incomes (GNI) ranging between US$1,026 and US$12,475.
Middle-income countries, which in Southeast Asia also include upper-middle income countries Malaysia and Thailand, are a diverse group, accounting for one-third of global GDP and major engines of global growth, the World Bank notes. Yet, for all the money that has begun to slosh around, hunger remains a huge challenge in Southeast Asia. As the 2017 Global Hunger Index (GHI) points out, hunger throughout the region is of moderate to serious severity, from Malaysia’s regional low of 10.2 to Laos’ regional high of 27.5 on the GHI severity scale. These scores draw upon data on undernourishment, child wasting, child stunting, and child mortality.
Our first Spotlight article by Dr. Kundhavi Kadiresan, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Regional Representative for Asia and the Pacific, traces how far we have come to eliminating hunger in the Asia-Pacific, and how much more we still have to go. She notes that while governments have pledged to get rid of hunger by 2030, over 490 million people in the region still go hungry most days. With other priorities, from climate change effects to shifting and aging populations, competing for government resources, it is little wonder that the fight against hunger is actually slowing in the Asia-Pacific region. What is worse: breaking a decades-long decline, the number of hungry people in some parts of Asia is rising again.
One important implication of being a middle-income country is the relatively greater resources a government can bring to bear on the basic problems its society faces: food, clothing, shelter, basic sanitation. Nevertheless, as our second Spotlight article suggests, few governments succeed in making the most of their expanded means. In Indonesia, in particular, quickly rising living standards have not meant a more secure access to affordable food. The country’s mediocre and stagnant ranking in the Global Food Security Index suggest Indonesians face chronic insecurity. Indonesia’s outdated thinking on what constitutes real food security, authors Rainer Heufers and Dr. Arianto A. Patunru argue, is just one factor that warps the country’s food policy.
In Southeast Asia, gains in a country’s economy often do not translate into better living conditions for many of its people. This is evident in the slowing fight against hunger in the region: too many Southeast Asians are food-insecure. Food policies in different countries throughout Southeast Asia often complicate the matter further. For those misguided policies to change, governments must rethink whom they really serve: rent-seekers in the food supply chain or citizens who must pay more than their share just to stave off hunger for one more day.
