NY Times: ““Spurred by agricultural innovation and generous farm subsidies, India now grows so much food that it has a bigger grain stockpile than any country except China, and it exports some of it to countries like Saudi Arabia and Australia,” Vikas Bajaj writes in The New York TImes. “Yet one-fifth of its people are malnourished — double the rate of other developing countries like Vietnam and China — because of pervasive corruption, mismanagement and waste in the programs that are supposed to distribute food to the poor. ”
The biggest gap is the inefficient, corrupt system used to get the food to those who need it. Just 41.4 percent of the grain picked up by the states from federal warehouses reaches Indian homes, according to a recent World Bank study. Critics say officials all along the chain, from warehouse managers to shopkeepers, steal food and sell it to traders, pocketing tidy, illicit profits. Poor Indians who have ration cards often complain about both the quality and quantity of grain available at government stores, called fair price shops.”
via Indias Failed Food System – NYTimes.com.
See also: How close will India be in 25 years?
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