Scenarios for a More Balanced Micronutrient Supply and Distribution in the World

Optimized food production and utilization can do more for alleviating micronutrient deficiencies in the world than the purely quantitative increase in food production (1). Belgian and US researchers have estimated that all food products currently produced on Earth are more than enough to meet the global demand for a high-quality diet of our world population. For example, if equitably distributed, vitamin B₁₂ out of foods would be enough to supply more than 16 billion people beyond the current world population [1] ; Vitamin A needs could be meet by an additional 9 billion people. However, the resources are distributed very differently. In particular, poor countries, including Uganda, cannot adequately meet the micronutrient needs of their populations.

Therefore, the experts call for a rethinking of nutrition and agricultural policies nationally and internationally. The evaluation of food production and trade in one country should not just take into account the supply of proteins, but the supply of the entire spectrum of essential nutrients more than so far. Thus, the availability of micronutrients in a region would have to be increased either by intensifying appropriate plant and animal breeding, by special imports or by an appropriate subnational distribution of already existing micronutrient-rich products.

Read more:
(1) SA Wood et al. Trade and the equitability of global food nutrient distribution. Nature Sustainability. Volume 1, pages 34–37 (2018). available at https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-017-0008-6

[1] Currently about 7,6 billion people live on the earth according to the German Foundation World Population, (state: June 2018), available at: https://www.dsw.org/oberes-menue/publikationen-downloads/zu-unseren-themen/weltbevoelkerungsuhr.html