022 Global Hunger Index (GHI) was officially released, among which India scored 29.1 points, which is a "severe hunger level".
The Indian government has very much objection to this. The Ministry of Women and Children's Development of India issued a statement saying that the index has been "stigmatizing" India for many years, shaping India into a "country that cannot meet its population's food security and nutrition needs." It also stated that the index is "difficult from reality and deliberately ignores the efforts made by the Indian government to ensure food security."
India also questioned the statistical method of the index, believing that it considers the data source of the "population malnutrition rate" among the four indicators, and it turned out to be a survey with a sampling rate of only 3,000 people.
Let’s not talk about the question of whether the global hunger index is accurate for the time being, but rather an obvious question: India and our country are both populous countries, and India’s arable land area is more than my country and its population is smaller than my country. Why is India’s grain output not as good as my country’s ?
Indian Agriculture
Let’s first look at the situation in India.
Although India's land area is not large, it has a lot of plains, and land suitable for cultivation is far more suitable than my country. The area of arable land has reached 155 million hectares of ; due to environmental protection greening measures such as returning farmland to forests and grasslands, has only 12.8 billion hectares of . In terms of arable land area, my country is far inferior to India, among which India's arable land area is the world's first, and my country's arable land area is the third in the world.
From the perspective of climatic conditions, Indian agriculture is simply a place where God appreciates food, monsoon climate, rain and heat during the same period, and India has more precipitation than my country, with an average annual rainfall of up to 1,200 mm. official even lists places with annual rainfall below 750 mm as a drought area. Our country is obviously incomparable to India's climate. If we follow Indian standards, our country's North China Plain , Northeast Plain , etc. are arid areas. The Huguang area, known as the hometown of fish and rice, has just left the drought line.
There is no lower temperature in India throughout the year, and crops can even reach three ripens a year, while crops in most areas of my country can only be ripened twice a year, or even one ripened once a year.
From the perspective of cultivated land area, climatic conditions and other conditions, India's agriculture has much better advantages than my country. In theory, India's grain output should crush us, but what is the result?
Let’s take a brief look at a set of data: since 2015, my country’s annual grain output has remained above 1.3 trillion jin for seven consecutive years, of which the annual grain output in 2021 reached 1365.7 billion jin, and per capita grain possession reached 483.5 kilograms. Even if imports and sufficient inventory are not considered, our per capita grain possession has long exceeded the internationally recognized "400 kilograms" food security line.
Moreover, we not only have a lot of grain production, but also have higher outputs of fruits, vegetables, chickens, ducks, fish, cattle, sheep, pigs, etc. than India, which means that we not only eat full, but also eat well.
Let’s look at the Indian data, From July 2017 to June 2018, the total grain output in India reached 57 million jin, ’s annual output is less than half of that in China. The per capita grain possession of is only slightly higher than 200 kilograms, and is far lower than the international food security standard line of “400 kilograms”. What is the level of
00 kg?
When the People's Republic of China was first founded, the per capita grain possession had reached 208.95 kg.
From the perspective of per capita food possession, although India said that the global hunger index has not objectively scored it, it is not much better. A large number of families in India are still mainly vegetarian, and some families are even facing hunger.
Grain
Some people may wonder why India’s arable land area is larger than that of our country and its climatic conditions are better than that of our country. Why can our country allow people to eat well and eat well?
This is actually because the yield of crops does not only depend on the arable land area and climatic conditions. also has a great dependence on water conservancy facilities, good varieties, fertile fields, fertilizers and pesticides, etc.
Let’s talk about water conservancy conditions first. Although India’s annual rainfall reaches 1,200 mm, there is an uneven distribution of precipitation time. India does not invest much in water conservancy facilities, and the effective irrigation area of farmland is less than 1/3, which makes them have to rely on the weather to make a living. If the monsoon is unbalanced that year, the rain will arrive early, or it will come late, and the more or less it will affect the yield of crops.
Because of backward water conservancy facilities, although India has good climatic conditions, it is difficult to produce high yields. For example: this year, India wheat grouting period , India encountered abnormal high temperature drought, and at this time, wheat demand for water is very high, but due to the inability to obtain irrigation, the wheat yield has been severely reduced.
Our country has attached great importance to water conservancy construction for a long time. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, it built multiple reservoirs and irrigation measures, and even built the South-to-North Water Diversion Project. Now, the effective irrigation area of China's farmland has reached 1.037 billion mu, accounting for 54% of the national arable land area. We are further building high-standard farmland to ensure stable harvests in drought and flood. Even in the year of disaster, people will not be affected.
Secondly, good varieties are the key to increasing grain yield and bumper harvest. The contribution rate of good varieties to yield is more than 47%. This is thanks to the continuous efforts of Chinese breeding scientists over the years, making the self-sufficiency rate of rice and wheat seeds in my country 1 is 100%, corn is about 95%, and the self-sufficiency rate of vegetable seeds reaches more than 87%. Only some seeds of high-end vegetables, such as broccoli, rely on imports.
India is not as good as others in breeding, and even suffered a great loss because of seeds. For example: The documentary "Bitty Seeds" tells the story of Indian farmers planting Monsanto genetically modified cotton . They originally expected that these cottons could be sold at a high price, but they did not expect that after buying seeds, they would also have to buy matching pesticides and waste materials. The cost was far more than usual, but the yield was not that high, which led to Indian farmers going bankrupt, and some even committed suicide because they could not repay their debts.
(Content: In the past, no farmers committed suicide. Every poor person can survive as long as they work hard)
Also, fertilizers and pesticides are also the key to a bumper crop harvest. Sri Lanka once radically promoted "green agriculture", which led to a serious food crisis in Sri Lanka, which was originally self-sufficiency, which eventually led to a national bankruptcy and social turmoil.
So, although India has a large area of arable land and good climatic conditions, their yield per mu is not high, and many farmers can't support themselves. Although India questioned that the "Global Hunger Index" listed itself as "severe hunger", domestic food issues are indeed worth thinking about.
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