Home and Community Gardens in South-East Asia

What are the problems?  Current food systems in the South-East Asian region are unsustainable in the context of both supply and demand of food.  The ‘double burden of disease’, where undernutrition and obesity coexist side-by-side, is a severe challenge in South-East Asia.  The proportion of underweight children in South-East Asia is 19 per cent, the third largest share after South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. At the same time, 12.7 per cent of under-five-year-olds in the region are either at the risk of being overweight, or obese.  Environmental sustainability and rapid urbanization, as in the broader Asia-Pacific region, are of growing concern in South-East Asia. As a consequence, the region is confronting enormous environmental challenges that are already serious, including air pollution, congestion, CO2 emissions, deprivation in water and basic sanitation, and vulnerability to natural disasters and climate change.