Extent of Food Security among Other Backward Class (OBC) Households: A Case Study of Lakhimpur District of Assam

Abstract

Food is one of the most crucial basic requirements of human life. Food and Nutritional Security are very much important for a healthy and active life. Therefore, food security should assure both adequate food supply and the nutrition that can fulfill demand of the people. It is a major problem of the state like Assam, because of shortage of food grain production, poverty and lack of nutritional knowledge. In this study, an attempt has been made to assess the status of food security among the OBC community of Lakhimpur district of Assam. For finding out the level of food security Per Capita per day Calorie Intake (PCCI) and Food Insecurity Gap (FIG) has been employed. For final assessment of the level of household food security, calculated calorie intake of sample households have been compared with the calorie requirements for household members on the basis of their age, sex and physical activity as recommendedby theIndian Council of Medical Research (ICMR, 2010). For obtaining final sample, multistage mix-sampling technique has been used. It has been found that out of 170 sample households only 51.76 percent household has been found as food secure and among the food insecure households 36.29 per cent households are far off from minimum level of calorie requirement.