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Wrestling with the ‘Double Burden’: Hunger and Obesity

A lack of access to nutritious food (one definition of food insecurity) leads to either poor choices, or no choices, when it comes to food options for families. As the globalization of the food market has introduced fast food restaurants and highly processed commercial products with high-fat and high-caloric content to even the most remote communities, people living in chronic poverty have turned to these sources for cheap, convenient food according to an article published by the U.S. Department for Agriculture. Consumed in place of wholesome grains and produce, these products are directly linked with weight gain, and are a major contributor to obesity.

Why should the hunger relief community care about the obesity epidemic? Aside from the moral imperative shared amongst all those under the umbrella of international development, and the fact that “for the first time, the number of adults in the world who are overweight exceeds the number of adults who are underweight”, there is a clear and meaningful link between the issues of hunger and obesity, as detailed in the recently published ‘Food Justice’. That is, these epidemics stem from the same source, namely a lack of access to the right kind of food.  Obesity and hunger are a direct result of food insecurity and are a ‘double burden’ in many developing countries; acknowledging this reality could lead to meaningful and productive partnerships.

Members of the anti-hunger community have traditionally approached the issue of obesity with caution, for fear of diverting attention or minimizing the urgency of the issues around hunger.  However,  given that food insecurity is a common root cause of both hunger and obesity, avoiding the topic and discounting this connection is a missed opportunity to collaborate on finding mutually beneficial solutions.

That being said, a more nuanced examination of the anti-hunger and anti-obesity communities reveals a fundamental difference in the missions of each, posing a challenge to collaboration . While the United Nations World Food Program (WFP) and the broader anti-hunger community are providing direct food assistanceto communities that are do not have a reliable source of food, the anti-obesity community is working to shift the choices of communities that already have some existing source of food, and thus face a set of challenges that do not parallel those of the hunger relief community.

Ultimately, there are fundamental and important similarities between these two communities, the problems they are addressing and the approaches they take, but they also have basic differences as well. Uniting around common aims, such as the Millennium Development Goals for eradicating hunger and poverty and improving child health, how can the two communities work together going forward to achieve the overall goal of improving the health of the global community?

Though the answers may not yet be clear, it’s a question worth asking, and a dialogue worth starting.