Food insecurity at moderate levels of severity is typically associated with the inability to regularly eat healthy, balanced diets. As such, high prevalence of food insecurity at moderate levels can be considered a predictor of various forms of diet-related health conditions in the population, associated with micronutrient deficiency and unbalanced diets. Severe levels of food insecurity, on the other hand, imply a high probability of reduced food intake and therefore can lead to more severe forms of undernutrition, including hunger. FAO has identified the FIES as the tool with the greatest potential for becoming a global standard capable of providing comparable information on food insecurity experience across countries and population groups to track progress on reducing food insecurity and
hunger
Prevalence of severe food insecurity in the population (%)
The percentage of people in the population who live in households classified as severely food insecure. A household is classified as severely food insecure when at least one adult in the household has reported to have been exposed, at times during the year, to several of the most severe experiences described in the FIES questions, such as to have been forced to reduce the quantity of the food, to have skipped meals, having gone hungry, or having to go for a whole day without eating because of a lack of money or other resources.
The assessment is conducted using data collected with the Food Insecurity Experience Scale or a compatible experience-based food security measurement questionnaire (such as the HFSSM). The probability to be food insecure is estimated using the one-parameter logistic Item Response Theory model (the Rasch model) and thresholds for classification are made cross country comparable by calibrating the metrics obtained in each country against the FIES global reference scale, maintained by FAO. The threshold to classify "severe" food insecurity corresponds to the severity associated with the item "having not eaten for an entire day" on the global FIES scale. It is an indicator of lack of food access.The indicator is calculated as an average over 3 years (eg. data for 2015 is the average of 2014-2016 data).