Hunger levels in Kenya have been classified as serious by a new global report.
The Global Hunger Index of 2020 gave Kenya a score of 23.7 ranking it in position 84 out of 107 countries.
Kenya’s level of hunger score is above the global average of 18.2 as it ranked behind other African countries including Algeria, Egypt, South Africa, Ghana, Senegal, Gambia, Gabon, Namibia, and Cameroon.
The Global Hunger Index is a peer-reviewed annual report, jointly published by Concern Worldwide and Welthungerhilfe, designed to comprehensively measure and track hunger at the global, regional, and country levels.
The GHI is designed to raise awareness and understanding of the struggle against hunger, provide a way to compare levels of hunger between countries and regions, and call attention to those areas of the world where hunger levels are highest and where the need for additional efforts to eliminate hunger is greatest.
The organisation gives a score based on data on child mortality, child undernutrition, and inadequate food supply to assess progress and setbacks in combating hunger.
In Kenya, the report states that 23 percent of the population is undernourished while 31.3 percent of children under five years are stunted.
At the same time, the child mortality rate is decreasing and is now at 4.1 percent.
The indicators included in the GHI formula reflect caloric deficiencies as well as poor nutrition. The undernourishment indicator captures the nutrition situation of the population as a whole, while the indicators specific to children reflect the nutrition status within a particularly vulnerable subset of the population.
The population may have a lack of dietary energy, protein, and/or micronutrients (essential vitamins and minerals) leads to a high risk of illness, poor physical and cognitive development, and death.
The inclusion of both child wasting and child stunting allows the GHI to document both acute and chronic undernutrition. By combining multiple indicators, the index reduces the effects of random measurement errors.
Data for the indicators come from data collection efforts by various UN and other multilateral agencies. Undernourishment data are provided by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). Child mortality data are sourced from the United Nations Interagency Group for Child Mortality Estimation (UN IGME).
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