At the UN Sustainable Development Summit held in September 2015, 193 member states adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The agenda aimed to achieve 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with 169 targets by 2030 (UN, n.d.). Member states officially began implementing the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development on January 1, 2016 (Sustainable Development Goals Report, 2016, p.2). SDGs have become a blueprint for global peace and prosperity. According to a survey conducted by GlobeScan and ERM Sustainability Institute, 84% of 500 sustainability experts from over 60 countries rated food security as the fifth urgent sustainability challenge in 2024 (Sustainability Leaders, 2024, p.7). The perceived urgency of food security increased by 5% compared to 2023 (p.7). Rather than focusing on all 17 SDGs, this blog examines global progress towards SDG 2, Zero Hunger, with primary focus on Nepal. 

Targets of Zero Hunger Goal

Zero Hunger Goal includes five targets. It aims to end hunger and malnutrition, double agricultural productivity and incomes of small-scale food producers, create a sustainable food production system and maintain genetic diversity of agricultural products by 2030 (UN, n.d). These five goals are outlined in more detail below.

“2.1 By 2030, end hunger and ensure access by all people, in particular the poor and people in vulnerable situations, including infants, to safe, nutritious and sufficient food all year round” (UN, n.d).

“2.2 By 2030, end all forms of malnutrition, including achieving, by 2025, the internationally agreed targets on stunting and wasting in children under 5 years of age, and address the nutritional needs of adolescent girls, pregnant and lactating women and older persons” (UN, n.d).

“2.3 By 2030, double the agricultural productivity and incomes of small-scale food producers, in particular women, indigenous peoples, family farmers, pastoralists and fishers, including through secure and equal access to land, other productive resources and inputs, knowledge, financial services, markets and opportunities for value addition and non-farm employment” (UN, n.d).

“2.4 By 2030, ensure sustainable food production systems and implement resilient agricultural practices that increase productivity and production, that help maintain ecosystems, that strengthen capacity for adaptation to climate change, extreme weather, drought, flooding and other disasters and that progressively improve land and soil quality” (UN, n.d).

“2.5 By 2020, maintain the genetic diversity of seeds, cultivated plants and farmed and domesticated animals and their related wild species, including through soundly managed and diversified seed and plant banks at the national, regional and international levels, and promote access to and fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from the utilization of genetic resources and associated traditional knowledge, as internationally agreed” (UN, n.d).

To support achieving these five targets, three means of implementation were put forward. They were increasing the investment in agriculture and rural development, preventing international trade barriers and market distortion in the world agricultural market, and adopting measures for proper functioning of the food market (UN, n.d) . These means of implementation are outlined in more detail below.

“2.A Increase investment, including through enhanced international cooperation, in rural infrastructure, agricultural research and extension services, technology development and plant and livestock gene banks in order to enhance agricultural productive capacity in developing countries, in particular least developed countries” (UN, n.d).

“2.B Correct and prevent trade restrictions and distortions in world agricultural markets, including through the parallel elimination of all forms of agricultural export subsidies and all export measures with equivalent effect, in accordance with the mandate of the Doha Development Round” (UN, n.d).

“2.C Adopt measures to ensure the proper functioning of food commodity markets and their derivatives and facilitate timely access to market information, including on food reserves, in order to help limit extreme food price volatility” (UN, n.d).

The Zero Hunger Goal seems to be a highly ambitious goal. The quote 'Shoot for the moon, and if you miss, you will still be among the stars' perfectly suits the goal. Even though the world may not achieve all the targets by 2030, the efforts will definitely bring substantial improvement compared to 2015. Almost nine years have passed since 193 member countries adopted this goal. The next section will cover the global progress on the Zero Hunger Goal.

Current Global Progress Towards Zero Hunger Goal

The UN Secretary General unveils an annual SDG progress report every year. The SDG progress report of 2024 shows that only 17% of 169 targets are expected to be achieved by 2030 (UN, 2024, p.3). Similarly, 30%  and 18 % of the targets have shown marginal and moderate progress respectively (UN, 2024, p.3). Likewise, 18% of the targets have stagnated, and 17% of the targets have regressed below the benchmark levels of 2015 (UN, 2024, p.3).  

According to the State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2024 report, jointly prepared by FAO, IFAD, UNICEF, WFP and WHO, it is estimated that around 733 million faced hunger in 2023, equivalent to 9.1% of the global population (p.11). It increased by approximately 152 million higher compared to 2019 (FAO, 2015, p.11). It is measured by prevalence of undernourishment. Figure 1 shows the prevalence of nourishment from 2005 to 2023 along with the number of undernourished people. 20.4% of the population in Africa are facing hunger, followed by 8.1% in Asia, 6.2% in Caribbean and Latin America and 7.3% in Oceania (FAO, 2015, p.11). Asia still houses more than half of the population facing hunger in the world; however, Africa will  replace Asia by 2030 in this regard (FAO, 2015, p.11). As per their projection, 582 million people will be chronically undernourished by 2030 in the world (FAO, 2015, p.11).

Figure 1: Trend of People Facing Hunger in the World

Source: State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2024, p.12

Similarly, 28.9% of the global population faced moderately or severely food insecurity in 2023 which is around 2.33 billion people worldwide (FAO, 2015, p.11). It is measured by the number of people who didn't have regular access to adequate food (FAO, 2015, p.11). It includes 10.7% of the world population, around 864 million people, who experienced severe food insecurity which means they ran out of food sometimes during the year and, at worst, passed an entire day or more without eating (FAO, 2015 p.13). In 2023, 58.0% people in Africa faced moderate or severe food insecurity which is almost twice the global average (FAO, 2015 p.13). Figure 2 shows the prevalence of moderate or severe food insecurity in different regions in the world along with the global average.

Figure 2: Trend of Global Food Insecurity

Source: State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2024, p.14

Likewise, the global average price of a healthy diet increased from 3.56 PPP dollars per person per day in 2021 to 3.96 PPP dollars per person per day in 2022 (FAO, 2015, p.15). 2.83 billion people were unable to afford a healthy diet in 2022 (FAO, 2015, p.15).  In Africa, the number of people who couldn't afford a healthy diet reached 924.8 million in 2022 which is 24.6 million higher from 2021 (FAO, 2015, p.15). Figure 3 shows the trend of people who were unable to afford a healthy diet.

Figure 3: Trend of Number of People Unable to Afford Healthy Diet 

Source: State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2024, p.16

Based on Progress assessment of SDG, Goal 2 is experiencing the most stagnation and regression compared to the rest as shown in figure 4.

Figure 4: Progress Assessment of 17 SDGs

Source: SDG Progress Report 2024, p.4

According to the SDG progress report of 2024, the assessment of each target of Zero Hunger goal is provided below in more details:

“Target 2.1: After a sharp increase following the COVID-19 pandemic, global hunger stabilized at around 9.2% of the population from 2021 to 2022. Between 691 and 783 million people faced hunger in 2022. Considering the midrange (735 million), 122 million more people faced hunger in 2022 than in 2019, when the prevalence stood at 7.9%. Additionally, an estimated 29.6% of the global  population – 2.4 billion people – were moderately or severely food insecure in 2022”( SDG Progress Report 2024, p.6).

“Target 2.2: Globally in 2022, an estimated 22.3% of children under age 5 (148 million) were affected by stunting, down from 24.6% in 2015 and 26.3% in 2012 (baseline year of WHO nutrition targets). Based on current trends, 1 out of 5 (19.5%) children under age 5 will be affected by stunting in 2030. Overweight affected 37.0 million children under age 5 (or 5.6%) and wasting affected 45 million (or 6.8%) in 2022” ( SDG Progress Report 2024, p.7).

“Target 2.3: The income gap between small-scale and non-small-scale food producers remains significant. In 95% of countries with available data, the average annual income of small-scale producers is less than half that of nonsmall-scale producers. Among small-scale food producers, units headed by men typically generate higher incomes compared to those headed by women“ ( SDG Progress Report 2024, p.7).

“Target 2.a: In 2022, global public expenditures reached $36 trillion, of which $749 billion went towards agriculture—an all-time high. Agriculture represented 2.1% of total government expenditure, a recovery from the pandemic, and is only marginally below the 2019 level. Government expenditure on agriculture relative to the agriculture sector’s contribution to GDP, measured in terms of the agriculture orientation index, declined from the 2015 baseline of 0.50 to 0.43 in 2021, but rebounded to 0.48 in 2022”( SDG Progress Report 2024, p.7).

“Target 2.b: Total notified annual agriculture export subsidy outlays fell from its peak of $ 6.7 billion in 1999 to $33 million in 2022. As of 1st January 2024, only least developed countries (LDCs) and net food importing developing countries are allowed to use certain forms of export subsidies” ( SDG Progress Report 2024, p.7).

“Target 2.c: In 2022, the share of countries facing moderately to abnormally high food prices reached a new record-high of 58.1% after falling by more than half in 2021 from the previous historical peak of 48% in 2020. The 2022 share represented a nearly four-fold increase from the 2015-19 average levels of 15.2%. Major disruption to logistics and food supply chains, following the breakout of the war in Ukraine, resulted in higher food and energy prices, particularly during the first half of 2022” ( SDG Progress Report 2024, p.7).

Thus, it seems highly unlikely to make the world free from hunger, food insecurity, and malnutrition by 2030.

Current Nepal’s Progress Towards Zero Hunger Goal

According to the 2024 Global Hunger Index (GHI), Nepal ranked 68th out of 127 countries. Nepal received a score of 14.7 which indicates Nepal still has a moderate level of hunger.  GHI score is calculated on a 100-point scale where a country with zero hunger receives score 0 and 100 if hunger is extremely alarming. Nepal has made significant progress towards  zero hunger in the last 2 decades which is shown in figure 5.

Figure 5: GHI Score Trend for Nepal

Source: Global Hunger Index 2024

The figure 5 shows that Nepal has moved from alarming hunger level in 2000 to moderate level in 2024. GHI is calculated using four indicators: Undernourishment, Child Stunting, Child Wasting and Child Mortality. 

First, Undernourishment shows the percentage of the population whose caloric intake is insufficient. Second, Child stunting shows the percentage of children under age 5 whose height is low for their age. Third, Child Wasting shows the percentage of children under age 5 whose weight is low for their height. Fourth, Child Mortality shows the percentage of the children who died before their fifth birthday. 5.7% of the population of Nepal are undernourished. Similarly, 24.8% and 7% of children are stunted and wasted respectively. Likewise, 2.7% children in Nepal died before their fifth birthday. Nepal has also made promising progress on each factor; however, the percentage of children who are stunted is still in double-digit as shown in figure 6.

Figure 6: Trend for Indicators Values-Nepal

Source: Global Hunger Index 2024

Based on Nepal’s progress on Global Hunger Index, it is not possible to examine its progress on SDG Zero Hunger Goal. The Zero Hunger Goal has more broader targets. Zero Hunger goal has 8 different targets as described earlier. These 8 targets have 13 different indicators. The National SDGs platform of the National Planning Commission (NPC) shows the time series data on Nepal’s progress on different 32 indicators of Zero Hunger. In addition , a joint portal launched by NPC, Central Bureau of Statistics and World Bank provides progress on 15 Zero Hunger indicators at the provincial level. It is important to examine how these indicators are calculated in the case of Nepal and what they truly represent. It is beyond the scope of this blog to examine Nepal’s progress on each indicator. To conclude, Nepal ranks 95th out of 166 countries with a 67.07 SDG index score as per the Sustainable Development Report 2024.