インドの食料問題と食料政策

―その構造と展望―

抄録

If we classify the food problem into two stages; i.e. the shortage of cereals for human direct consumption as the first stage, and the shortage of cereals for feeding animals for human use (meat, egg, milk, etc.) as the second stage, India is now in a transitional period from the first stage to the second one. Complicated is such a fact that whereas there remains a large number of malnutrition populations, India emerged as a major rice exporting country after the mid-1990s, and also, there is no symptom so far of shortage of cereals for feeding animals despite the rapid and accelerated economic growth during the last two decades. This paper analyses the structure of food problem in India, especially in relation to the food policy measures and thus discusses the future prospects of the problem. The major conclusions are as follows. First, rising food prices after the 1990s due to the mismanagement of public procurement and distribution system for foodgrains is one of the major factors which finally turned India into a rice exporting country. Second, however, per capita human direct consumption of cereals started to decline since the early 1980s, which together with the decelerated population growth is a more fundamental factor behind the change of the situation. Third, with the accelerated economic growth, demand for animal products has been rapidly growing since the 1980s, although rather small in absolute terms. Fourth, livestock feeding is still basically non-intensive in nature, depending less on cereals. Still, the demand for coarse cereals (especially maize) has been increasing rapidly, which has however been met by the increase of domestic production so far. Fifth, there is a possibility in the near future for India that it will face a shortage of coarse cereal production for animal feed, whereas it continued to face a structural over-production of rice and wheat.