SDG 2 - Zero Hunger explained

✍️ Article written by Peter Gringinger, sustainability expert and facilitator of the SDGs Multipliers Online Training course, by Gaia Education.

Hi #sustainability champions, today we continue our  journey exploring the individual SDGs one by one to polish our knowledge and upskill in SDG learning. As mentioned before we plan to send out a post approximately once or twice weekly until we have gone through all 17 SDGs. Today we tackle  SDG 2 - Zero Hunger You can follow or connect with us and see what we have to offer related to upskilling your change maker abilities (of tools and training) on our SDG toolkit webpages. ✔

So let’s explore Sustainable Development Goal 2 (SDG 2), also known as  "Zero Hunger" in a concise manner suitable for learning.

What is SDG 2?

SDG 2 is one of the 17 goals established by the UN to create a sustainable future. It specifically aims to end hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture by 2030.

Why does SDG 2 Matter? 

Hunger, food insecurity, malnutrition  and unsustainable food production  are global issues that affect billions of people, especially children (148 million children are dangerously malnourished). Achieving SDG 2 is crucial because it's not just about providing food; it's about ensuring that all people have continuous access to nutritious food that meets their dietary needs for an active and healthy life. This goal is fundamental to human well-being and is a building block for other SDGs. Hence it is clear that hunger and healthy and sustainable food is a multifaceted and multidimensional complex issue from the global to the local. 

In a world where up to 783 million people —  almost 1 in 10 of the world’s population — face chronic hunger (with the most of them in Africa and Asia), and where 2.33 billion people experience moderate to severe food insecurity, understanding the scope and drivers of this crisis is more important than ever. From armed conflicts, which often also leads to displacement and extreme weather events to the lasting socio-economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic or general economic strife and rising food prices, global hunger levels are at a critical point and rising. But on the other side are escalating levels of obesity (> 1 billion people), diabetes, cardio-vascular diseases, cancer and more linked to poor nutrition and lowe food quality, which have significant knock on effects on many other areas (like the health systems, education,  employment and economic development (also issues of child labour or child marriage), etc).  

Particularly hunger and food insecurity has significantly increased in recent years, due to escalating conflicts, lingering COVID-19 effects, severe weather, rising food prices and more. Achieving zero hunger requires intensified efforts to transform food systems so they are sustainable, resilient and equitable. Moreover, accelerating improvements in diets, nutrition, health and hygiene is crucial to meeting the target of halving the number of children suffering from chronic undernutrition, or overeating and poor diets. However, progress in these areas so far is either regressing or stagnating other than increased investment into agriculture worldwide, but this is not always geared towards sustainable agriculture (also including small scale family owned agriculture, which is responsible for the food production of the majority of the world population and should be supported as part of SDG2 as well as access to land, technology and markets)  nor towards fulfilling the needs of a country's population. 

This is why, like all SDGs, SDG 2 does apply to all countries and covers much more than hunger (however we define it). This goal is fundamental to human well-being and is a building block for many other SDGs.

Key Targets and Indicators:

SDG 2 has 8 targets and 13 indicators to measure progress (if you want to know the exact lengthy wording in the Agenda 2030 you should have a look here) :

• End all forms of hunger and malnutrition in all its forms everywhere

• Achieve food security and sufficient affordable access to nutritious food for all

• Secure the genetic diversity of food production

• Support sustainable food production particularly of small hold farmers and provide resources and support as well as access to markets 

• Support sustainable and resilient agricultural production 

Challenges and Progress: 

As statistics show progress on zero hunger has largely gone backwards in recent years and many aspects/targets of this goal have largely not been tackled in an appreciable manner, and one could argue that at least more than a quarter of people experience moderate to severe food insecurity but 1 in 8 people in the world are extremely overweight (obese) and up to 1 in 3 are overweight in many developed countries  

‘To reach zero hunger is a common and shared responsibility. Hence its about high time to work together as partners to set up a global movement and network to secure the right to food for everyone’ Ban Ki-moon, former Secretary General of the UN

Overall the latest UN SDG progress report on SDG 2 shows either regression or stagnation and significant acceleration is required on SDG 2 targets, with for example more than 60% of countries facing significant food price rises. If you would like to know more about where your country currently stands with SDG 2 (and all other SDGs), you can check out the latest Sustainable Development Report - Country Profiles (as well as Rankings, Interactive Maps and a Data Explorer), and additional visual presentations available on Our World in Data and in a wider context work and publications of  the International Expert Panel on Sustainable Food Systems IPES Food. 

With 30 to 50% of food produced in developed countries going to waste, we also have a food distribution problem that causes people to go hungry. Without food (SDG2), water (SDG 6), shelter (SDG 11) and education (SDG 4), people cannot be expected to contribute to thriving economies (SDG 8). 

• Hunger is a symptom and not a cause of systemic dysfunctionality in our production and consumption systems (SDG 12) and our economic system (SDG 8). 

• Hidden subsidies for large scale global food businesses, externalising the environmental & social impacts of industrialised agriculture and international trade treaties that criminalise the protection of local and regional food economies, create an unfair economic playing field.  

• When global agribusiness practices make farmers dependent on only a few seeds produced exclusively by their companies makes farmers dependent and vulnerable. 

How can we achieve an end of hunger in all its forms everywhere?

Like any of the SDGs, achieving the end of hunger (and the complex targets related to it)  will require multi-dimensional but context specific approaches. Instead of listing some generic ‘solutions’, which are likely removed from the realities of most local communities wherever they are, just a few general concepts and directions of value  may include:

• A localised and regionalised food system (SDG 2) builds strong local economies (SDG 8) and resilient communities (SDG 1). Organisations which have supported this systemic approach to local food sovereignty include FAO, Food Watch, Slow Food and Via Campesina, and many more.

• Local (small) farmers and vibrant local food economies create social (SDG 1, 3 & 11), economic (SDG 3, 8 & 12) and ecological benefits (SDG 13 to 15) while celebrating cultural diversity (SDGs 11 & 16). 

• What food we eat and how we grow it has a huge impact on local ecosystems and healthy ecosystem functions. There are many benefits to growing food closer to its point of consumption and ensuring regenerative and organic farming. Safeguarding the global & local diversity of food plants and creating seed-saving projects to protect heirloom varieties is critical. 

As you may now already know that Gaia Education’s approach for regenerative design and development,is about the context specific potential of each and every place and community and to support the life affirming or life regenerating local conversations and co-creative processes which should be a starting point of whole systems based realisation of SDG 2 and all strongly linked and all other SDG systemically together, we provide some useful questions to ask yourself or a group you work with in relation to SDG 2 (sourced from the Gaia Education SDG Flashcards) in a multidimensional manner in the social, ecological, economic and worldview/cultural spheres. 

This should provide you with another  flavour into how one can possibly work with the SDGs in different (not top down but bottom up) and generative approaches. Based and part of the Gaia Education SDG Flashcards, they contain more than 200 questions on the system-wide approach to achieving the 2030 Agenda.

These cards enable a participatory and problem-centric group conversation and solutions oriented multi-perspectival dialogue. They invite participants to engage and to collaborate to identify actions and solutions to implement the SDGs in ways that are relevant to their lives and communities, locally. This is an effective way to establish local community ownership and realisation for the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

The SDG Flashcards are used in the SDG Training of Multipliers (online and face-to-face). Check out the freely downloadable SDG Training of Multipliers Handbook for a detailed description of how to prepare, promote, and how to use these cards more easily to promote community activist training, in various settings (e.g. local public bodies, communities, schools, universities, business etc.) as well as many other tools from our SDG webpages.

There are of course many examples of working on SDG 2 and hunger in all its forms sometimes also in a systematic way, and sources where to find such examples from different contexts were provided in one of the previous posts. 

Gaia Education has and is also not only involved in educational and training offerings which support the implementation of the SDGs including SDG 2, but is part of projects and initiatives where at least one, mostly several SDGs are targeted. Examples of project involvement with a focus on SDG 2 are: 

Increasing Food Security, Income Generation & Environmental Sustainability in the Podor Region, Northern Senegal 

This three-year food security project engaging four villages of the Podor Region of northern Senegal – Guédé Chantier, Lahel, Moundouwaye and Diarra – supported female villagers to adapt 16 hectares of community land to produce organic food more efficiently, and increase the communities’ resilience and capacity to adapt to the advancing effects of climate change.

The project strengthened the communities’ social, economic and ecological competence and built skills in agroforestry, permaculture, food processing and social enterprise. It directly benefited over 3,000 community members, 85% of whom were women.

Design for Sustainability & Organic Food Systems for Asylum Seekers in Denmark

Six-week Course for Asylum Seekers in Design for Sustainability and Organic Food Systems, taking place in Avnstrup, Denmark. Enhancing solidarity between migrants and local communities. Enhancing ethical, fair and transparent business relations, increasing autonomy from the agro-industrial system, promoting viable livelihoods. Understanding the impact and developing resilience to climate change in food, land, biodiversity and water systems.

How does your local community SDG project look like? 

Let’s take our future into our own hands, and start your SDG journey and locally based community project now!

And to close if you would like to learn much more about SDG 2 and all other SDGs and the Agenda 2030 and many more topics approaches and methods to practically work with the SDG in your local context we encourage you  to start or re-invigorate your personal SDG journey through the upcoming online SDGs Multipliers course, starting on 17th February 2025. 

For more and the video affine the SDG 2 Zero Hunger - UN SDGs  - DEEP DIVE

✍️ Article written by Peter Gringinger.

Peter is a change agent and works with the use of whole systems, transition and regenerative design approaches, principles and methods, including permaculture, to provide support through integral and participatory facilitation for individuals, groups, neighborhoods, communities and organisations to co-create and co-design our sustainable futures of regenerative and thriving cultures, places, environments and local but globally networked livelihoods. Peter has a background and extensive experiences in earth systems, environmental and sustainability sciences and has been involved in many small to large projects in these fields of practice in a number of countries and regions around the world, with a recent focus on training, education and facilitation for regeneration.He is a Gaia Education certified trainer, a GEN Ambassador, Earth Charter Educator and Ecological Footprint Trainer and is or was actively involved with GEN Australia and Austria, Cohousing Australia and Transition Towns Austria.