He Minister of Agrarian Development and Irrigation, Angel Manero, He assured that he would be classified as a case of severe food insecurity, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), because he does not eat dinner.
These statements were made in an attempt to minimize the report of the UN agency that revealed that in Peru 51% of the population is in a situation of moderate and severe food insecurity.
When asked what sIt means for him “to go hungry”cabinet member Adrianzén avoided giving a concrete answer and excused himself by stating that this is “something relative.”
“(Look, that is relative. For example, I do not eat dinner. And I would be classified by the FAO as having severe food insecurity, because I do not eat dinner any day,” he replied.
Minister downplays FAO study: “They haven’t done any field work”
Faced with this strange example, the reporter pointed out that the study does not refer to people who have the privilege of being able to choose whether to eat or not, but to those who cannot eat properly due to lack of resources.
The minister countered by saying that there are some countries where people only eat twice a day, while in Peru, we are used to eating three times. He also downplayed the FAO study because it was only based on surveys.
“And it must also be said that the FAO study has not done any field work. They are based on 4,000 surveys that have been done. Here, field work must be done to measure calories, proteins and all that,” he added.
Head of Midagri is alarmed by the rate of overweight in Peru
On another occasion, Minister Manero insists that the FAO data do not reflect reality, because even the Ministry of Health revealed that in Peru there is a high rate of overweight people.
“Because you certainly have more than enough with a hearty breakfast and lunch. And that brings us to another topic, to say what the Ministry of Health has published, that we have 16 million overweight Peruvians. It is precisely because we have an excess of calories,” he stressed.
However, he later acknowledged that two of the country’s food problems are poverty and anemia.
“We recognize that there is poverty in Peru, we recognize that there is anemia in Peru. But there is also poor nutrition, it is not a problem of quantity, but of quality. There is very poor nutrition in most of Peru,” he explained.
It should be noted that in recent days, Minister Dina Boluarte has been questioned for saying that there is no hunger in Peru. However, at all times, the official said that his statements were taken out of context and that he always tries to see the positive side of things.
