NAIROBI, March 12 (Xinhua) -- Kenya has made significant progress in reducing the number of hungry and malnourished citizens though disjointed policies and climatic shocks could reverse the gains, says the Global Hunger Index (GHI) report launched in Nairobi on Wednesday.
The report attributed the government's robust policies and improved funding towards the agriculture sector for the drop in the food insecure population for the last two decades.
"Although there has been some slight improvement in the number of people going hungry in Kenya, there remains a significant challenge, with a score of 25.2, Kenya must step up interventions to eradicate hunger and malnutrition, "said Kelvin Shingles, country director of international charity, Welt Hunger Hilfe.
Kenya ranks position 86 out of 117 qualifying countries in the annual global hunger report with 26 percent of Kenyans likely to be undernourished.
The report said that in recent decades, gradual progress has been made in reducing hunger but still hard-won gains are being threatened in many countries amid extreme poverty, poor governance and climate change.
Oscar Magenya, the director in the State Department for Agricultural Research said the government has put invested in food security programs to help insulate vulnerable demographics like children and the elderly from malnutrition.
"We cannot continue being hungry forever, we are implementing agriculture flagship projects to increase the income of farmers and boost food security among rural and urban poor," said Magenya.
He said the government and development partners have earmarked adequate funds to support fertilizer subsidy for small-holder farmers, insurance for livestock keepers in semi-arid counties and school feeding programs as a means to achieve hunger-free status in line with UN sustainable development goals.
"The fertilizer subsidy program will run concurrently with support for soil analysis to help farmers get the inputs they require to produce a bumper harvest," said Magenya.
He said the government has also rolled out a raft of policy and regulatory reforms to encourage involvement of youth in agriculture in order to tackle hunger and unemployment.
