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The World Bank's January 21, 2025, Food Security Update addresses the ongoing global concern of food security, a frequently discussed topic in policy development. Food security is defined as access to sufficient, affordable, and nutritious food that meets dietary needs. The World Bank works to strengthen food security by providing financial and advisory support, promoting resilient food systems, and responding to crises to ensure global access to nutritious food. If not handled properly, it leads to food insecurity, the opposite of food security. Food insecurity occurs when there is limited or uncertain availability of suitable food, resulting in hunger, malnutrition, and other harmful effects on individuals and societies. This includes the effect of food insecurity known as Hidden Hunger, the presence of multiple micronutrient deficiencies caused by rising food prices disproportionately affecting poorer households which spend a greater proportion of their incomes on food (Fu et al., 2025).

The concept of food security emerged at the 1974 World Food Conference, which focused on ensuring adequate global supplies, and was further refined at the 1996 World Food Summit to emphasize individual access to safe and nutritious food. Currently, food security affects people of all classes, states, genders, and religions. There are four main dimensions of food security in accordance with the World Bank: (1) Physical Availability of Food, (2) Economic and physical access to food, (3) Food utilization, and (4) Stability of the other three dimensions over time. These dimensions are used as a framework to comprehensively analyze and address food security challenges and help as well in policy making.

Recent global food price data presents a mixed and often misleading picture for consumers. While some reports highlight price decreases compared to the previous year, the actual situation for most people is far more complicated. For example, even if the wholesale price of wheat is low, that does not automatically translate to cheaper bread at the grocery store. The cost of getting that wheat from the farm to your table involves many other factors—processing, transportation, and retail costs, and these are reflected in those higher export and domestic price indexes, which can be connected to the fast-growing globalization. These indices incorporate all these factors. Another particularly troubling fact is the lingering high cost of staples like maize and rice compared to pre-pandemic. Maize, a key ingredient in many animal feeds and food products, is up by 2%. This has a ripple effect across the food chain, possibly driving up the cost of everything from meat to processed foods. The data points to a larger problem of sticky inflation, where food prices do not fall as quickly as they rise.

Aside from food prices, trade is another factor linked with global food security. The State of Agricultural Commodity Markets 2024 by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) emphasized that trade is crucial in allocating the supply of food. In particular, food surplus in some regions will be transferred to areas where food is scarce, thus contributing to food security. One actual event depicting the role of trade in food security is witnessed during Russia's invasion of Ukraine, where rising trade-related policies (i.e., trade restrictions on food and fertilizer to increase local supply and reduce prices) were imposed by countries, resulting in the worsening of the global food crisis. Food trade also influences dietary patterns and nutritional outcomes as it shapes food availability, diversity, and prices across people and countries. Hence, some negative concerns are being raised as food markets are globalized, arguing that it can increase inequality in countries with resource-poor farmers and contribute to worse diets and nutritional outcomes given the rising access to energy-dense and low-nutrition foods. 

In 2020, around 821 million people are facing undernutrition, 151 million children under the age of five are affected by stunting, 613 million women and girls aged 15 to 49 suffer from iron deficiency, and 2 billion adults are either overweight or obese. The food system is being strained by both non-climate factors (e.g., population, income growth, and the increasing demand for animal-based products) and the impacts of climate change (Mbow et al., 2020). All these factors contribute to the persistence of food insecurity and malnutrition worldwide, as supported by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA), highlighting that more than 280 million people face acute hunger daily. 

The World Food Programme (WFP) has also published an article focusing on the global food crisis, asserting that 1.9 million people are enduring severe hunger—primarily in regions of Gaza, Sudan, South Sudan, Haiti, and Mali (WFP, 2024). Meanwhile, in Asia and the Pacific, 88 million people suffer from hunger caused by climate-related disasters, which impede their food systems and livelihoods. Latin America and the Caribbean are gravely affected, with over 40 million people experiencing food insecurity and 14.2 million needing immediate assistance (United Nations, 2024). 

Focusing on the Philippines, a study discovered that the country is ranked third with the highest incidence of moderate and severe food insecurity in Southeast Asia, affecting 44.1% of the population—a total of 51 million Filipinos for the years 2021-2023 (IBON Foundation, 2024). In addressing food insecurity in the country, the national government has always opted for short-term solutions such as rice importation instead of long-term solutions. In particular, the government's approach is complicated by import inefficiencies and conflicting definitions: "food security" allows imports, while "food self-sufficiency" prioritizes local production, yet the practice favors importation (Baviera, Tadem, & Royandoyan, 2019). Apart from this, the issue of the global food crisis has a more staggering impact among the young people. Stunting, according to the World Health Organization, is the impaired growth and development that children experience from poor nutrition, repeated infection, and inadequate psychosocial stimulation. Stunting during early childhood, especially within the first 1000 days from conception to age two, can have lasting negative effects on a child's development. These effects may include poor cognitive abilities and educational outcomes, lower earnings in adulthood, reduced productivity, and, if followed by excessive weight gain later in childhood, a higher risk of nutrition-related chronic diseases in adulthood. Currently, the prevalence of stunting in children under 5 years old is at 22.3%, meanwhile, in the Philippines, the numbers is more staggering, one out of three children are stunted or short for their age. Stunting after 2 years of age can be permanent, irreversible and even fatal – a reason of which is undernutrition and lack of adequate [nutritious] food intake among children. 

International organizations, such as the World Bank and WFP, have taken initiatives and interventions to address food insecurity across the globe. The World Bank has created a portfolio for food and nutrition security covering 90 countries and is expected to benefit 296 million people, while WFP is continuously calling for global action in the form of financial and diplomatic support among countries to reach the target of 16.9 billion dollars to feed the 123 million hungriest people worldwide in 2025 and ultimately, help vulnerable communities build long-term resilience against food insecurity (World Bank Group, 2025; United Nations, 2024). Meanwhile, other multiple institutions and organizations have also offered solutions to resolve food insecurity emphasizing that consistent income growth and stable prices can improve food affordability through agricultural growth. In the case of the Philippines, proposed solutions involve financial reforms, Detailed Investment Plans (DIPs), and support for Farmer Organizations (FOs), with continuous monitoring to ensure effectiveness in combating food insecurity (PIDS, 2024; SDSN, 2023). Actual outcomes and degree of effectiveness for the said initiatives and interventions are currently yet to be seen in 2025.