Food and Nutritional Security Scenario of BPLFamilies of CentralKerala

Food security is the imperative pre requisite for the economic and social stability of the family, community and nation. The deprivation of the basic need represented by food insecurity and hunger are possible precursors to nutritional, health and developmental problems. The problem of food and nutritional insecurity remains as a great threat to large number of poor and vulnerable people across the world. At the global level, the South Asian region is the home to more chronically food insecure people than any other region in the world. Food insecurity in rural India is primarily a reflection of rural poverty, and thus overall economic growth and its distributional pattern are important in solving the hunger problem. Even though, the poverty rate in Kerala is low among the Indian states, numerically the size of BPL families still holds a serious attention. Though, Central and State Governments are trying to overcome food insecurity through various programmes, systematic studies onthe extent of food and nutritional security among BPL families of Kerala has not been taken up so far. In this back drop,the present study was conducted in Central Zone of Kerala.