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National Food Security Bill
1. NATIONAL FOOD SECURITY BILL
Will it make the Dream of a Hunger-Free
India into a Reality?
2. WHAT IS FOOD SECURITY?
WORLD HEALTH
ORGANIZATION (WHO)
Food Availability - Having available
sufficient quantities of food on a
consistent basis
Food Access - Having sufficient
resources, both economic & physical, to
obtain appropriate foods for a nutritious
diet
Food Use - Appropriate use based on
knowledge of basic nutrition and care,
as well as adequate water and sanitation
FOOD AND AGRICULTURE
ORGANIZATION (FAO)
Definition - Food security exists
when all people, at all times, have
physical and economic access to
sufficient, safe, and nutritious food to
meet their dietary needs and food
preferences for an active and healthy
life
Components - Availability, Access,
and Absorption (nutrition)
3. GLOBAL SCENARIO
Globally, per capita annual availability of grain has declined between the
1970s and the 2000s.
34% (1969-71)
16% (2004-06)
20% (2009)
Proportion of undernourished in the
developing world…
Liberalization
Policies in Third
World
Decline in rate of
growth of output
of grain &
oilseeds since 1990
Output
growth rate
2.2% pa
(1970-90)
1.3% pa
(1990-07)
Yield growth
rate
2% pa
(1970-90)
1.1% pa
(1990-07)
4. INDIAN SCENARIO
Amartya Sen‘s ―Poverty & Famines‖
Major problems - unemployment,
declining wages, and poor food
distribution systems
International Food Policy Research
Institute‘s
2011 Global Hunger Index
60 million children – Underweight
21% population - Malnourished
World Bank Report
Productivity losses in India due to stunted growth,
iodine deficiencies, and iron deficiencies – 3% of GDP
Net Availability of
Food Grains
1961 – 469
gms/day
2007 – 443
gms/day
Per Capita
Availability
1991 – 501 gms 2007 – 443 gms
GDP growth 1992-92 (6-7%) 2005-06 (9%)
Child Malnutrition 1998-99 (52%) 2005-06 (46%)
Underweight
Children
1998-99 (47%) 2005-06 (46%)
5. NUTRITION EMERGENCY
Dissociation between GDP growth and
changes in the status of malnutrition is
due to distribution problem, as the wealth
created is unequally shared
Significant increase in
food grains has not been
able to keep pace with the
increase in population.
6. 2010 GLOBAL HUNGER INDEX – INDIA’S POSITION
A Trivia: In a remote
hamlet of Uttar Pradesh,
Musahar women follow
field rats to their burrows
to scrape out grains
stashed away by the
rodents. When things get
worse, they sift through
cow dung for undigested
grain—all this to feed their
starving families.
- Ash in the Belly:
India’s Unfinished
Battle against Hunger,
Harsh Mander
7. WHERE DOES INDIA STAND?
Proportion of
undernourished in the
population (%)
Prevalence of
underweight in children
under five years (%)
Under five mortality
rate (%)
GHI
Country 1990-92 2004-06 1988-92 2003-08 1990 2008
1990 (with data
from 1988-92)
2010 (with data
from 2003-08)
Bangladesh 36.0 26.0 56.5 41.3 14.9 5.4 35.8 24.2
China 15.0 10.0 15.3 6.0 4.6 2.1 11.6 6.0
Haiti 63.0 58.0 22.5 18.9 15.1 7.2 33.5 28.0
India 24.0 22.0 59.5 43.5 11.6 6.9 31.7 24.1
Nepal 21.0 16.0 47.2 38.8 14.2 5.1 27.5 20.0
Pakistan 22.0 23.0 39.0 25.3 13.0 8.9 24.7 19.1
Somalia - - - 32.8 20.0 20.0 - -
8. URBAN POVERTY
• Every
seventh
person in
urban
India a
slum
dweller
• Increase
in Urban
Inequality
National
Sample
Survey
2002
• Rate of
reduction in
poverty
slowed
down since
1991
• Significant
in urban
areas
Official
poverty
count
• 7.63
crores in
1993-94
• 8.08
crores in
2004-05
Urban BPL
• 320.3
million in
1993-94
• 301.7
million in
2004-05
Poverty in
India
• Hazardous
living
conditions
• Absorption
of nutrients
• 30% higher
costs of
food than
rural poor
• 60% more
of total
expenditure
on food
Other
issues
10. INTERNATIONAL NORMS ON FOOD SECURITY
• The Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948, Article 25(1):
―Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-
being of himself and his family, including food . . . .―
• International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights 1976:
―Right of everyone to an adequate standard of living, including adequate food,
clothing, and housing…‖ and ―the fundamental right of everyone to be free
from hunger . . .‖
• Convention on the Rights of the Child 1990: ―To combat disease and
malnutrition . . . . through the provision of adequate nutritious foods, clean
drinking water, and health care‖
• General Comment 12 (Twentieth session, 1999) of UN: The Right to
Adequate Food (Art. 11)
11. FOOD SECURITY NORMS IN INDIA
The Supreme Court Case (April 16, 2001) - People Union for Civil Liberties(Rajasthan)
submitted a ―writ petition‖:
• Starvation deaths becoming National Phenomenon while there is surplus stock of food
grains in government godowns .Does right to life mean that people who are starving are
too poor to buy food grains free of cost by State from the surplus stock lying with the
State particularly when it is lying unused and rotting?
• Does not the right to life under Article 21 of the Constitution of India include the right
to food?
• Does not the right to food which has been upheld by the apex Court imply that the State
has a duty to provide food especially in situations of drought to people who are drought
effected and are not in a position to purchase food?
In 2001, during a visit to Jaipur it was observed that 5 kms outside the city, Food Corporation
of India (FCI) godowns were overflowing with grains kept outside. Fermented by rain, it was
rotting. 5 kms from the godowns was a village where the people were eating in rotation,
classically called ―rotation eating‖ where some members of the family eat on one day and the
remaining persons eat on the other day. In 2001, 60 million tonnes were in FCI godowns,
whereas buffer stock required were 20 million tonnes. The Government had 40 million tonnes
above the buffer stock and people were dying of starvation. On that simple proposition the
PUCL in Rajasthan filed a case, which came to the Supreme Court.
12. • Court affirms the right to food as necessary to uphold Article 21 of the
Constitution of India, which guarantees the fundamental right to ―life with
human dignity‖
• Closed PDS shops to be re-opened within one week
• Food Corporation of India (FCI) was ordered to prevent wastage
• States given the responsibility over implementation of schemes
– Employment Assurance Scheme
– Mid-day Meal Scheme
– Integrated Child Development Scheme
– National Benefit Maternity Scheme for BPL pregnant women
– National Old Age Pension Scheme - destitute persons over 65 years
– Annapurna Scheme
– Antyodaya Anna Yojana
– National Family Benefit Scheme
– Public Distribution Scheme for BPL & APL families
FOOD SECURITY NORMS IN INDIA
13. PROGRESS SO FAR
2001: Constitutional Court recognizes right to food in the
People‘s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) case, transforming
policy choices into enforceable rights
2005 : Adopts its National Rural
Employment Guarantee Act and the
Right to Information Act
2009: India is developing
a National Food Security
Act
2011: Food Security Bill
cleared by Cabinet
January, 2013: NFSB
cleared by a
parliamentary committee
14. NATIONAL FOOD SECURITY BILL, 2011
SALIENT FEATURES
A draft legislation to “provide for food and nutritional security, in human life
cycle approach, by ensuring access to adequate quantity of quality food at
affordable prices, for people to live a life with dignity and for matters
connected therewith or incidental thereto…”
• Legal entitlement to food grains at subsidized prices under the Targeted PDS
• Providing food grains at subsidised prices as under:
Priority Households
(more than 46% rural & 28% urban)
General Households
(less than 64% rural & 72% urban)
Quantity 7 kg per person per month 4 kg per person per month
Price Rice: Rs. 3/kg
Wheat: Rs. 2/kg
Millets: Re. 1/kg
<=50% of Minimum Support Price
(MPS)
• Legal entitlements for child & maternal nutrition, destitute & other vulnerable groups
• Reform of the Public Distribution System
• Min. coverage, entitlement & price to remain unchanged till end of XII 5-year plan
15. IMPLEMENTING NFSB 2011
• District Grievance Redressal officer
• State Food Security Commission
• National Food Security Commission
GRIEVANCE REDRESSAL
MECHANISMS
• Allocating food from central
government pool to state
governments
ALLOCATION OF FOOD
• Records maintained stringently and
made public
• Periodic social audit to be conducted
• A vigilance committee to be set up
TRANSPARENCY AND
ACCOUNTABILITY
16. ACHIEVING FOOD SECURITY THROUGH NFSB
• Adequate quantity of quality food made available at subsidised prices
• Coverage to
– Destitute persons: >= 1 meal a day, free of charge
– Homeless and other needy: affordable meals at community kitchens
– Migrants and families: subsidies entitled
– Emergency & Affected by disaster: 2 meals a day, free of charge – up to 3 months
• Entitlement to equivalent amount of food security allowance (cash) in case of inability of
government to provide food grains
• Identifying targeted households – same target can be used for other welfare schemes
• Extension to other essential commodities such as coarse grains, oil, pulses, etc.
• Extension of Targeted PDS to cover entire population, as Universal PDS
• Agrarian reforms; Improving procurement, storage & distribution mechanisms for food grains
• Reform of the PDS and its extension
• Provide universal access to:
– Safe and adequate drinking water and sanitation
– Health care
• Nutritional, health and education support to all adolescent girls
• Special nutritional support to persons with ailments such as HIV/AIDS, leprosy, TB etc.
17. RANGARAJAN COMMITTEE (EXPERT COUNCIL)
Favours legal entitlement of subsidized
food grains to the poor (BPL), but has
rejected the NAC‘s recommendation that
APL households be partially covered - not
feasible at the current levels of grain
production and procurement
Entitled population: Defined as the
percentage of population below the official
poverty line + 10% of the BPL population
(Using the Tendulkar poverty line – 46%
rural & 28% urban population)
Subsidized food grains to be restricted to
the really needy - rest can be covered
through an executive order with varying
quantums, depending upon availability of
food grains
Grain requirement 74 million tonnes in final
phase in 2014, while total availability with
the government in 2011-12 and 2013-14 is
likely to be 56.35 million tonnes and 57.61
million tonnes respectively, based on the
current production and procurement trends
– Not possible to implement
Price of subsidized food grains for BPL
might be linked to inflation and indexed to
the Consumer Price Index, and the price at
which wheat and rice was to be made
available to APL might be linked to the
minimum support price (MSP).
Other welfare schemes which must also be
treated as mandatory and buffer stock, there
will be around 5.4 million tons of food
grain which can be used for distribution to
the remaining population at an issue price
equal to MSP.
18. RECOMMENDATIONS BY EXPERT COUNCIL
NAC Rangarajan Committee
1. Estimating food
grain requirement
Population projections by
National Commission on
Population for Oct 2010
Phase 1 – October 2011
Phase 2 – October 2013
2. Requirement of
food grains
Phase 1 - 54.04 mn tonnes
Phase 2 - 58.58 mn tones (Off
take: 95% BPL, 85% APL)
Phase 1 - 58.76 mn tonnes Final
phase - 63.98 mn tonnes
(Off take considered to be 100%)
3. Estimating
availability of food
grains
Have used current estimates
by the Dept of Agriculture
Have to use more conservative
estimates, as highly dependent
on rain and drought
4. Subsidy
implications
Estimated using current
population estimates
Will go higher - further increase
in popln, costs of scaling up of
procurement, warehouse
facilities and buffer stock
5. Distribution PDS system Modified PDS as per Justice
Wadhwa report, Food
stamps/coupons, Smart cards
19. ARGUMENTS IN FAVOUR
OF NFSB
1. Existence of famine – affected
areas despite surplus population
2. Extremely low levels of
nutrition and rising levels of
poor as per statistics
3. Article 21 of the Indian
Constitution – Fundamental
Right to Life
4. Article 47 of the Directive
Principles of State Policy –
Public health as primary duty
5. India party to International
Covenant on Economic, Social
and Cultural Rights (ICESCR)
MAJOR ARGUMENTS AGAINST NFSB
1. High costs in implementing a universal PDS
2. At Rs. 18 and Rs 14 per kg for rice & wheat,
20 crore card holders with overall ratio of 2:1
between rice and wheat, costs for 25Kgs of
distribution - Rs. 82000 crore and for 35 Kgs,
Rs. 150000 crore
3. Providing highly subsidized food distorts
private markets – may lead to further inflation
in prices of food grains
4. Possibility of act becoming another political
largesse and a propaganda tool
5. Government should not determine the
prices of private goods like food,instead take
measures to augment the income levels of
poor by increasing education and employment
opportunities.
20. REFORMS IN PDS (PUBLIC DISTRIBUTION SYSTEM)
• Consolidate existing guidelines, give them due publicity
• Compress time involved in completion of the selection
process from 56 to 42 days
• Should be a resident of the concerned circle where the FPS
is
• Allot new vacancies for FPS to cooperative societies or
women self help groups.
APPOINTMENT
OF DEALERS OF
FAIR PRICE
SHOPS (FPS)
• Equal distribution of ration cards, End-to-end automated
system to plug leakages
• Incentives to FPS dealers to sell other commodities with
SFAs like wheat & rice
• Fixed Accountability for any delay in delivery of SFAs
• For BPL category, door delivery of SFAs to the FPS by
State govt.
• Increase commission of FPS dealers
VIABILITY OF
FAIR PRICE
SHOPS
21. REFORMS IN PDS (PUBLIC DISTRIBUTION SYSTEM)
• Transportation of SFAs - handled by the state
government
• Net gain on transportation account – give to FPS dealers
• E-banking for payment of cartage charges
• GPS – To track trucks carrying SFAs
TRANSPORTATION
OF SPECIFIED
FOOD ARTICLES
UNDER PDS
• Identify genuine beneficiaries under AAY/BPL
• Increase income threshold of BPL: Rs. 24,200/- to Rs.
49,284/-
• Remove/limit APL category -annual income Rs. 1 lakh
• Clear delineation of functions of each position in PDS
EFFECTIVE
TARGETED PDS
• Police department should be directed to act on
complaints - Essential Commodities Act, 1955
• Fast Track Court for cases pertaining to violations -
revoke FPS license
• Make Fortified Atta available
• Computerizing operations up to Go down level
OTHER NOTABLE
RECOMMENDATIONS
23. EFFECTIVE PDS: CHHATTISGARH CASE
COVERAGE UNDER PDS:
• 70% of total population
• 80% - 90% of the actual poor
• Tribal & socially vulnerable
populations
• All parts of the state,
including Internal Conflict
ridden areas
• In addition to BPL families,
covers persons with disability,
Old and destitute, Women
headed households
• Shield from food price rise by
supplying 50% of staple
cereal requirement
• Includes oil, pulses in PDS
WHAT WAS DIFFERENT ABOUT
PDS?
• Combining Integrated Child
Development Services with
PDS: malnutrition in children
declined 54% to 38%
• De-privatization of PDS shops
• Shops owned by bodies like
Gram Panchayats, Women‘s Self
Help Groups and Forest
Protection Committees
employing tribals
• Increase in commission of PDS
shop owners: Rs 8 per quintal to
Rs. 35
• Interest-free loans up to Rs.
75000
• Apart from BPL category,
included the disabled, old,
destitute & primary tribals
24. RECOMMENDATIONS FOR FOOD SECURITY
1. Alleviate the root cause, instead addressing only the symptoms -
correct supply chain issues, which would increase availability of
food while reducing costs
2. Revisions to FDI rules to start rapid improvement in the food
supply chain due to influx in supply chain modernization
techniques from foreign players like Wal-Mart
3. Avoid intervention into the food economy by government; rather
develop infrastructure for agriculture to make rural poor self-
sufficient
4. Strengthen the implementation of already existing alternate
government schemes like NREGA
25. REFERENCES
• Justice Wadhwa Committee report on Public Distribution System submitted in 2007
• The task of making the PDS work by Jean Dreze, Honorary Professor at the Delhi School of
Economics, published in The Hindu on July 8, 2010
• Working Paper: RIGHT TO FOOD IN INDIA by S. Mahendra Dev, Centre for Economic
and Social Studies
• Systems of Public Food Distribution and Procurement of Rice: Experiences from Chhattisgarh
state of India by Samir Garg
• ‗How the PDS is Changing in Chhattisgarh‘, an article on ibnlive website
http://ibnlive.in.com/news/how-the-pds-is-changing-in-chattisgarh/137153-7.html
• ‗Effective PDS tackles malnutrition in Chhattisgarh‘: Article by Ejaz Kaiser published in
Hindustan Times Raipur on March 16, 2013
• Sharma, D. (2005). ‗Hold Economists Accountable too‘. India Together, 4 April. Available at:
www.indiatogether.org/2005/apr/dsh-subsidies.htm
• Asian Development Bank (ADB) (2005). Key Indicators of Developing Asian and Pacific Countries,
Manila: ADB
• Khera, Reetika (2009): ―Right to Food Act: Beyond Cheap Promises‖, Economic& Political Weekly,
Vol 44, No 29, 18 July, pp 40-44.
• Dreze, Jean,Democracy and Right to food, Economic and Political Weekly, April 2004
• ‗The Human Right to Food in India‘, George Kent, University of Hawaii, March 12, 2002
• ‗Food Security in India: Performance, Challenges and Policies‘, September 2010, OIWPS - VII