Rome, Italy · 12 July 2021 — Five United Nations agencies jointly released the 2021 edition of The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI), delivering the first comprehensive, evidence-based assessment of global food insecurity during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. The findings were stark: hunger had risen dramatically, years of progress had been erased, and the world was not on track to achieve the Zero Hunger target (Sustainable Development Goal 2) by 2030.
Produced jointly by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), the World Food Programme (WFP), and the World Health Organization (WHO), the SOFI report is the most authoritative annual assessment of global food security and nutrition.
The Numbers
The 2021 report documented a dramatic reversal in the fight against hunger.
The global prevalence of undernourishment (PoU) climbed to approximately 9.9 percent in 2020, up from 8.4 percent in 2019. This single-year increase was unprecedented in the report's history and effectively wiped out gains that had been made over the previous five years.
Key Findings at a Glance
| Indicator | 2019 | 2020 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| People facing hunger (mid-range) | ~650 million | ~768 million | +118 million |
| Prevalence of undernourishment | 8.4% | 9.9% | +1.5 pp |
| Moderate or severe food insecurity | ~2.0 billion | ~2.37 billion | +370 million |
| Unable to afford a healthy diet | — | ~3 billion | — |
Nearly 2.37 billion people lacked access to adequate food in 2020 — an increase of approximately 370 million people in a single year. The report also highlighted that approximately 3 billion people could not afford a healthy diet, a figure that underscored the structural nature of malnutrition beyond simple caloric deficiency.
Drivers of the Crisis
The SOFI 2021 report identified three major drivers that were exacerbating food insecurity and malnutrition, all of which were intensified by the pandemic:
1. Conflict
Armed conflict remained the single most significant driver of hunger. In 2020, the majority of the undernourished population lived in countries affected by conflict. The pandemic did not displace conflict as the primary driver but compounded its effects by disrupting humanitarian access and economic activity in conflict-affected regions.
2. Climate Variability and Extremes
Climate shocks — including droughts, floods, and storms — continued to undermine food production and livelihoods. The 2020 desert locust upsurge in East Africa, driven by unusual cyclone activity, was cited as an example of how climate variability can trigger cascading food security crises.
3. Economic Slowdowns and Downturns
The COVID-19 pandemic triggered the deepest global recession since the Second World War. The economic downturn reduced incomes, disrupted supply chains, and eroded the purchasing power of hundreds of millions of people. The SOFI report identified this as the primary new driver of hunger in 2020, responsible for much of the year's increase.
Regional Disparities
The burden of hunger was not evenly distributed. Africa remained the region with the highest prevalence of undernourishment, with one in five people on the continent facing hunger. Asia, despite having a lower prevalence, was home to the largest absolute number of undernourished people due to its population size.
Latin America and the Caribbean saw one of the sharpest increases in food insecurity, driven by the economic fallout of the pandemic. The report noted that in some middle-income countries, the economic shock was more damaging to food security than direct supply disruptions.
The Healthy Diet Gap
A particularly striking finding of the SOFI 2021 report was its analysis of the affordability of healthy diets. The report estimated that approximately 3 billion people could not afford the cheapest possible healthy diet — one that meets dietary recommendations for adequate energy and nutrient intake.
This finding reframed the food security challenge. For decades, the focus had been on caloric sufficiency — ensuring enough food to prevent hunger. The SOFI report argued that this was insufficient: a food system that provides calories but not nutrients leaves populations vulnerable to the dual burden of undernutrition and obesity, both of which were rising.
Implications for SDG 2
The report delivered a sobering message about the feasibility of achieving Sustainable Development Goal 2 (Zero Hunger) by 2030. Even if the pandemic's economic impacts were reversed, the structural drivers — conflict, climate change, and economic inequality — would continue to push hunger in the wrong direction without transformative change in food systems.
The five UN agencies called for a series of actions:
- Humanitarian–development–peace nexus approach in conflict-affected areas, integrating food security interventions with peacebuilding efforts
- Climate-resilient agriculture investments to help communities adapt to increasing climate variability
- Social protection systems that are scalable and adaptive to protect the most vulnerable during economic shocks
- Food system transformation to make healthy diets affordable and accessible, including through policies that reduce the cost of nutrient-rich foods
A Precursor to the Food Systems Summit
The SOFI 2021 report was released just over two months before the UN Food Systems Summit, held in September 2021. The report's findings provided the empirical foundation for the Summit's central argument: that incremental improvements to existing food systems were insufficient, and that transformative change was needed across production, processing, distribution, and consumption.
The report's emphasis on the affordability of healthy diets, the compounding effects of multiple drivers, and the need for coordinated action across humanitarian, development, and peacebuilding domains shaped the agenda of the Summit and the National Pathways that countries subsequently developed.
Sources
- FAO, IFAD, UNICEF, WFP, WHO. 2021. The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2021. Rome, FAO. Interactive report:
- FAO Flagship Publications:
- FAO SDG Events — SOFI 2021 Launch:
- Policy Commons, SOFI 2021:
FIRAT Editorial Board
Institutional Research Desk · Foresight Institute of Research and Translation
The collective editorial and research translation board of FIRAT, synthesising peer-reviewed evidence, policy briefs, and division milestones across our seven foundational research pillars.
