Although malnutrition remains prevalent, India is now self-sufficient in cereal production.

Major famines of the late 20th century have occurred in Africa. Contributing factors have included drought, desertification (the spread of deserts), poor soils and growing conditions not suited to advanced agricultural techniques, rapid increases in population, and inadequate attention to food production by some governments. Famine in Africa has recently been most severe where wars or civil unrest exist, as in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC, formerly Zaire), Chad, the southern Sudan, Ethiopia, Mozambique, and Somalia.

In the early 1990s the world produced more than enough food for the 5.3 billion people on the planet, and it was probably capable of growing enough to feed the significantly larger population projected for the first part of the 21st century. To eliminate famine and reduce malnutrition, however, attention needs to focus not only on food production but also on food distribution, consumption, and family planning. Many countries are establishing nutrition surveillance systems designed to predict famines before they occur; through such efforts and early government action, future deaths due to starvation may be prevented.