Corona virus: How is the epidemic affecting food in Arab countries?

The Executive Director of the World Food Program, David Beasley, is pessimistic. Last month he warned of multiple famines around the world within months.

Beasley said there is a real risk that the number of people dying from economic complications from the outbreak will exceed the number directly killed by the virus.

He also mentioned that around 135 million people around the world faced hunger before the outbreak, meaning any further hardship due to the outbreak could push them into starvation.

Today, experts confirm that this year’s global harvests are sufficient for everyone and there is no shortage.

But the problem is the disruption caused by shutdowns and export restrictions that many deem unnecessary and can be avoided without threatening the security measures necessary to limit the spread of the virus.

Certainly the effects of what is happening on food security will differ from country to country, but also from group to group.

In the Arab region we find extreme cases. Some countries are suffering from harsh climatic conditions, but they are lucky to have extra money to buy solutions. Others have moderate and varied climates facing bankruptcy or war.

The Gulf countries suffer from a harsh desert climate and severe water scarcity, which means the agricultural sector in them cannot be the backbone of what they consume for food. On the other hand, he has enough money to invest in his food security.

Over the past decade, he has focused his attention on three basic strategies, which are, in order of priority: increasing storage capacity, investing in agricultural land abroad and investing in modern agricultural technologies that allow to control the climate and save water.

Engineer Najeeb Hamad Al-Hamid, director of Middle East and Africa at Farrelly & Mitchell Consulting Services in Food and Agriculture, said those countries, especially Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, “were also keen to diversify sources of food imports. “

As for Saudi Arabia, for example, “the rice comes from India, Pakistan, Vietnam and Thailand,” he says. But all this does not necessarily mean that it is immune to the repercussions of the crisis, especially if it is prolonged.

He adds: “As for us in the short term, we have no problem at all, as if the crown does not exist. But if (the crisis) lasts after August, the shortage will start. it will not be an interruption, we will not suddenly become in front of zero stored material, but rather we will enter using the backup storage, ie we start with the risk phase. ”

In addition, the Gulf States, particularly Saudi Arabia, are now facing a difficult economic situation due to the collapse in oil prices, resulting from the collapse of demand amid global shutdowns. . As long as prices remain low, pressure on the country’s budget will increase.

Saudi Finance Minister Muhammad Al-Jadaan said the Kingdom had not witnessed a crisis of this severity in recent decades and that it should take “painful” steps to address it.

On the outskirts of the Gulf Cooperation Council countries, we find Yemen, which suffers from all the misfortunes at the same time: a bitter war, poverty and chronic water shortage.

A year ago, the World Food Program said that about 20 million Yemenis, or about 70 percent of the country’s population, lack food security.

He added that nearly 10 million of them are on the brink of famine.

As for this year, the calamities are increasing. At the start of last month, the World Food Program announced that it would cut humanitarian food aid to Houthi-controlled areas in half.

Lisa Grande, the United Nations representative in Yemen, said it was impossible to imagine a worse time for such a reduction, amid the Corona epidemic crisis.

Lebanon imports more than 80 percent of its food and suffers from an economic collapse which affects its ability to import into it.

This is a simple summary of the essence of the acute food crisis that is now threatening the country, and has prompted many to speak in recent months of the possibilities of nightmare that could reach the point of famine.

The crisis also prompted some to urge people to cultivate where they can, to secure what was available for themselves and their families in a new, very harsh phase that the country would accept.

However, even if this reduces the need for some, it will not be a saving factor in the absence of a strategy for the state, at the level of the country as a whole, that examines the needs and coordinates efforts to import. which is irreplaceable and provides support for a collapsed agricultural sector that post-civil war governments ignored.

Lebanon will also be more sensitive than others to any overall increase in the prices of raw materials it imports, such as wheat for example.

But all of the current crises in Lebanon predate the coronavirus and will likely extend well beyond the decline of the epidemic. The collapse of the national currency, the closing of institutions and the increase in the unemployment rate have accelerated since last year, and food security is affecting a lot.

Syria was known to be relatively self-sufficient, but it was hit by a severe drought that started in 2007, which resulted in large migration from the countryside to the outskirts of the cities.

After that came the uprising, which quickly turned into several wars on Syrian lands. Syria has been hit by sanctions and the collapse of Lebanon has also affected the value of the Syrian pound.

“New data for the World Food Program indicates that commodity prices have increased in the past year by only 107%,” said Jessica Lawson, spokesperson for the program in Syria. “This means that many in Syria are not doing it. Have access to healthy and useful food.”

She added: “With the spread of the Covid-19 epidemic in Syria and around the world, families have lost their source of income overnight. This can worsen the crisis of vulnerable groups and push them further and further. more towards hunger. “

Whatever the impact of the epidemic, it worsens the crises that already affect hundreds of millions of people around the world, including people who suffer from hunger every day.

And those of “normal” days are out of the attention of the power centers and out of the spotlight. Their problems are poverty, wars, droughts and desertification, the increase of which is linked to climate change.

But in a time of crisis, everyone’s attention is focused on food. Lebanon is an example, as the question of the source of food in the future has become a concern of the poor and the rich, albeit to varying degrees.

Today, those who are used to extravagance in consumption and luxury have joined the hungry to think carefully about his food and that of his children in the medium and long term.

Bishara Boujouda is an amateur farmer in Lebanon who provides assistance to a number of recent farming enthusiasts. He says there is a high demand from all groups because “There are well-off young people who have resorted to farming. There are also unaffordable young men who have resorted to farming.”

Now that people have started to feel how the system all over the world has collapsed, in addition to the economic situation in Lebanon, the question has become in the back of their minds, will I be able to find a kilo of tomatoes even if i have a million pounds to buy it?

Every place has its own crisis, but there is something that unites everyone in the medium to long term when it comes to global food security.

The number of people is increasing as farmland cannot expand enough to feed everyone if prevailing production and consumption patterns are maintained as they are, except at the expense of forests, the environment and the climate .

In addition, although small domestic supply chains have been affected, international supply chains have been hit hardest by the coronavirus.

For some, this indicates that there is an overdependence on international trade in commodities such as food, and that we need to think not only about food security, but also about food sovereignty, albeit relative.