Food Security: Definition, Causes, and Global Facts
Author: Disabled World (DW)
Updated/Revised Date: 2 Nov 2026
Table of Contents:
Synopsis - Definition - About This Section - FAQs - Publications - Subtopics
Synopsis
Understand what food security means, how climate change, water shortages, and poverty affect world food supplies, plus key global hunger facts and statistics.
At a Glance
- 1 - About 673 million people, 8.2 percent of the world, faced hunger in 2024.
- 2 - 150.2 million children under age 5 were stunted by chronic undernutrition in 2024.
- 3 - Food security rests on four pillars: availability, access, utilization, and stability.
- 4 - About 2.3 billion people faced moderate or severe food insecurity in 2024, according to the United Nations.
Topic Definition
- Food Security
Food security exists when all people, at all times, have both the physical and economic means to obtain enough safe and nutritious food to support an active, healthy life. It is not simply a question of having food on hand, but of steady availability, affordability, and the ability to acquire food in socially acceptable ways that also respect people's dietary needs and preferences. The idea covers households as well as nations, and it includes a measure of resilience against future disruptions such as droughts, wars, fuel shortages, and economic instability. Because it touches production, distribution, nutrition, and health all at once, food security is best understood as a whole-system concern that affects everyone rather than a matter of poverty alone.
Overview
Food security exists when all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life. This definition was agreed at the World Food Summit in 1996 and is used by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) [Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, 1996]. Food security also includes resilience: the ability of households and countries to keep getting enough food through droughts, conflicts, price rises, shipping disruptions and other shocks.
Food security is usually described in four parts, often called pillars:
- Availability: the supply of food through production, stocks, distribution and trade.
- Access: whether people can afford and obtain food, including the economic and physical means to get it.
- Utilization: whether the body can make good use of the food eaten, which depends on a varied diet, safe water, sanitation and health care.
- Stability: whether availability, access and utilization hold steady over time.
In the United States, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) defines household food security as access by all members at all times to enough food for an active, healthy life, and food insecurity as limited or uncertain availability of nutritionally adequate and safe foods, or limited or uncertain ability to acquire acceptable foods in socially acceptable ways. Food insecurity in the United States has been measured through questions in the Census Bureau's Current Population Survey.
Global Hunger and Food Insecurity Facts
- Between 638 million and 720 million people, about 8.2 percent of the world's population, faced hunger in 2024, with a central estimate of 673 million, down from 8.5 percent in 2023 [FAO et al., 2025].
- About 2.3 billion people, or 28 percent of the global population, faced moderate or severe food insecurity in 2024 [FAO et al., 2025].
- Africa has the highest share of people facing hunger: more than 20 percent of its population, or about 307 million people [FAO et al., 2025].
- About 150.2 million children under age 5, or 23.2 percent, were stunted (too short for their age because of chronic undernutrition) in 2024, and 42.8 million were wasted (too thin for their height) [UNICEF, World Health Organization and World Bank Group, 2025].
- At the same time, 2.5 billion adults were overweight in 2022, including 890 million living with obesity, so many countries face undernutrition and obesity at once [World Health Organization, 2025].
- In the United States, 13.5 percent of households were food insecure at some time during 2023 [U.S. Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service, 2024].
What Affects Food Security?
- Poverty: Families with enough income rarely suffer chronic hunger, while poor households suffer most and are most at risk during food shortages, price rises and famines.
- Conflict: War and violence destroy farms, markets and supply routes and are a leading cause of food crises.
- Climate change and extreme weather: Droughts, floods and heat waves reduce crop yields and livestock production.
- Water shortages: Groundwater is falling in many farming regions, including parts of northern China, India and the United States, because of over-pumping for irrigation.
- Land degradation: Erosion and intensive farming can exhaust soil fertility and lower yields.
- Plant and animal diseases: Outbreaks affecting crops or livestock can quickly cut food supplies, especially where there are no contingency plans.
Genetically Modified (GM) Crops and Food Security
Genetically modified crops, mainly soybeans, maize (corn), cotton and canola (oilseed rape), are grown widely in the Americas and parts of Asia. A 2016 review by the U.S. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine found no substantiated evidence that foods from GM crops were less safe to eat than foods from conventionally bred crops [National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 2016]. Critics argue that most commercial GM crop development has served large farms and the food, feed and textile industries rather than the staple crops grown by poor farmers in developing countries, and that seed patents raise farmers' costs. Learn more about genetically modified foods.
So-called "terminator" seeds, genetically modified to produce sterile seeds so that farmers cannot save seed for the next season, caused widespread concern. The technology has never been commercialized, and in 2000 the Convention on Biological Diversity recommended a moratorium on its field testing and commercial use.
Food Security and Disability
People with disabilities are more likely to experience food insecurity because of lower incomes, extra living costs, barriers to work, and difficulty shopping for or preparing food. Programs such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), home-delivered meals and food banks can help.
Food security is not just a poverty issue. It involves the whole food system, from farming and trade to how food is shared within a household, and it is closely linked to health.
Frequently Asked Questions
What are the four pillars of food security?
The four widely recognized pillars are availability, access, utilization, and stability, and together they describe whether enough safe food exists, whether people can obtain and use it well, and whether that supply holds steady over time.
What is the difference between food security and food insecurity?
Food security means reliable access to enough safe and nutritious food, while food insecurity describes limited or uncertain access to adequate food or the inability to acquire it in socially acceptable ways.
How is food security different from food sovereignty?
Food security focuses on whether people have access to enough safe food, while food sovereignty emphasizes the right of communities to control how their food is produced, distributed, and traded.
What is chronic hunger?
Chronic hunger is a long-term, ongoing shortage of food that leaves people consistently unable to meet their basic dietary needs, often as a result of extreme and persistent poverty.
How does food security relate to disability?
People with disabilities can face higher risks of food insecurity because of added living costs, employment barriers, and difficulty accessing or preparing food, which can affect both nutrition and overall health.
What role does food waste play in food security?
Reducing food waste can improve food security by making better use of existing supplies, since food lost during production, storage, and consumption represents resources that could have fed more people.
Can individuals help improve food security?
Individuals can support food security by reducing waste, backing local and sustainable farming, donating to food programs, and encouraging policies that address hunger, poverty, and fair access to resources.
What is a food desert?
A food desert is an area where people have limited access to affordable, healthy food, often because the nearest supermarket is far away and public transport is poor. People with disabilities and those without a car are hit hardest.
References
- FAO, IFAD, UNICEF, WFP and WHO. (2025). The state of food security and nutrition in the world 2025. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.
- Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. (1996). Rome declaration on world food security and World Food Summit plan of action.
- National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. (2016). Genetically engineered crops: Experiences and prospects. The National Academies Press.
- UNICEF, World Health Organization and World Bank Group. (2025). Levels and trends in child malnutrition: Joint child malnutrition estimates, 2025 edition.
- U.S. Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service. (2024). Household food security in the United States in 2023.
- World Health Organization. (2025). Obesity and overweight [Fact sheet].
Curated and edited by Ian C. Langtree, Founder and Editor-in-Chief, Disabled World. This section is maintained by the Disabled World editorial team. Last updated: