Council on Foreign Relations highlights in charts and graphs some of the most pressing trends to follow in 2023, including the Asia-Pacific’s arms race, the changing relationship between India and Russia, and worsening brain drain in sub-Saharan Africa. Over 820 million people—more than 10 percent of the world’s population—go to bed hungry each night. Today’s food insecurity is a product of various factors, including regional conflicts and climate shocks, and Russia’s war in Ukraine has exacerbated the crisis. Food costs have soared to their highest levels in over ten years. Tracking by the International Food Policy Research Institute (see the Food & Fertilizer Export Restrictions Tracker) shows that twenty-one countries maintain food export restrictions, covering 7 percent of global trade in calories. Many of these were imposed by Group of Twenty (G20) countries, a collection of the world’s largest economies. In fact, just over half of all food export restrictions are from G20 economies.
