Attachments
In Brief
Food security situation started worsening. More than one in ten households (13%) was moderately food insecure, which is an inclining trend compared to the last month. The global food crisis, high national inflation rates, high food prices for several key commodities, and high fuel and fertilizer prices continued to impact the food security and well-being of households over a long period. Comparatively, 5 percent higher households reported relying on coping all over the country than in December. Approximately 53 percent reported restoring to livelihood-based coping, which was 48 percent in December. Returning to reliance on coping was mostly due to some cold waves, constrained livelihood opportunities for reduced pressure in seasonal rice and vegetable cultivation, debt, and debt recovery.
Food security varied in divisions with an increasing trend mostly. Despite improvement over time, households in almost all the divisions showed an inclining trend of food insecurity. Mostly for poor households, their livelihood depends significantly on seasonal opportunities. The low-income households experienced the highest hardship in putting food on the table, which varied across divisions but remained a constant phenomenon over time.
The survey revealed that 22 percent were food insecure in low-income households, compared to 7 percent in medium-income households and less than 1 percent in high-income households. Barishal Division was the highest having the most food insecure population.
High food prices remained the most significant and constant worry. Some 68 percent of households said the rise in food prices was their deepest concern and significantly affected their well-being. In comparison, 21 percent of households worried about health expenditure increases, and 19 percent mentioned the burden of debt or loans to cope with food insecurity. Most of the major food commodity prices kept rising.
More Households relied on coping strategies to keep food on the table. More than half of the households applied livelihood-based coping strategies such as borrowing money, selling productive assets, or going into debt to buy food. On average, the percentage was 1 percent higher than in the previous months, which is 2-3 percent in some divisions.
Households continued relying both on food-based and livelihood-based coping strategies. Some 26 percent of households applied food-based coping, which was 41 percent in the low-income group, the highest among different income groups.