Facilitating Smallholder Farmers’ Market Access
In the OIC Member Countries
18
Fundamental Changes in Food Demand and Global Food Trade
As discussed, consumers in OIC member countries are demanding more vegetable oils,
animal products (meat and dairy foods), and sugar and less of their traditional staples
(cereals, roots, and tubers); with rising incomes, they are also demanding more processed
food. Per capita consumption of cereals in OIC member countries rose by 16 percent
between 1980 and 2009, whereas daily per capita consumption of other foods rose much
more rapidly (vegetables rose by 35 percent; vegetable oils, by 36 percent; and meat, by
37 percent) . An even more dramatic change is occurring in consumers’
spending on different types of food products. In many countries, middle-class consumers
now spend more on protein-based foods than on cereal-based foods. In some countries,
even the poor are spending more on meat and less on cereals, due to cost differentials and
their own subsistence production. These changes in the composition of food demand and
changes in the relative value of food expenditures are reshaping both the upstream and
downstream segments of the food industry.28
The composition
of global food
trade has also
changed. Between
1980 and 2010,
the share of
cereals and cereal
preparations in
world agricultural
exports declined
from 19 percent to
13 percent, as did
the shares of
coffee, tea, cocoa,
and spices (10
percent to 7
percent) and
textile fibers (6
percent to 2 percent). On the other hand, shares of animal and vegetable oils, fruit and
vegetables, and animal fodder and feed in global agricultural trade grew steadily
. The changing composition of global agri-food trade also influences domestic markets in
developing countries by presenting producers with new opportunities and requirements.
28 The “upstream segment” refers to input suppliers and farmers; the “downstream segment” refers to
processors and retailers.
FIGURE 7: AVERAGE FOOD SUPPLY IN OIC MEMBER COUNTRIES, 1980–
2009 (KCAL/CAPITA/DAY)
Source: FAOSTAT (FAO 2014).