Food security in low developed countries – the case of the D.R. Congo

Abstract

The article focuses on food security in the least developed countries, through a case study of the Democratic Republic of Congo (D.R. Congo), a low-income country with a food deficit, with one of the lowest rates of gross domestic product per capita in the world. The article presents the context after gaining independence in 1960, the last five years, starting with 2017 and the current context of D.R. Congo in 2022, briefly developing the demographic situation, which have a direct impact on food security. The study has as inputs the data provided by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC). The D.R. Congo continues to live in a particularly unstable political, economic, and social climate. If currently the western part of the country, including the capital Kinshasa, is no longer the scene of violent clashes and demonstrations, in many other provinces armed gangs, non-governmental militias, ex-military and tribal groups are active, carrying out assaults and raids with massacres of civilians. However, in the D.R. Congo, most deaths are not caused by the violence of the ongoing conflict in the African country, but rather by malnutrition and a poor medical system. Thus, food insecurity is one of the first two factors generating deaths in the D.R. Congo.

Keywords

• food security and insecurity
• agriculture
• ipc
• economic growth
• population growth