2. Zero hunger

From a Swedish perspective, the challenge within this goal is to prevent malnutrition, for example by breaking unhealthy eating habits and promoting physical activity (Glokala Sverige n.d.).

The goal in a local context

The City of Malmö can contribute to the fulfilment of the goal by, for example, working to improve water quality, preserve important agricultural land, reduce food waste and promote healthy and nutritious diets in schools, health and social care. The City of Malmö also supervises food handling and can thus ensure food quality.

What it looks like in Malmö

Sustainable food production systems

Sustainable food production systems are important for our long-term livelihoods. Agriculture should help maintain ecosystems, strengthen climate adaptation capacity and gradually improve soil and land quality. An important step in this is to increase the share of arable land under organic farming.

The share of organically cultivated arable land in Malmö has risen since 2010 from 6 to 8 per cent in 2022. Overall, the increasing share of organically cultivated land is mainly because the total arable area in Malmö has decreased. Between 2010 and 2022, the actual area of organically farmed land increased by 27 hectares, while the total area of farmland decreased by 500 hectares, which then affects the share to a greater extent. Malmö has an important role in the preservation of agricultural land as almost one third of the municipality's land area consists of agricultural land, which is among the highest quality in Sweden. Agricultural land is subject to various conflicting interests, such as food production, new buildings and biodiversity (Miljöbarometern n.d.). As the proportion of organically farmed land decreases, soil depletion worsens, access to clean water deteriorates and biodiversity declines. Declining acreage is thus a challenge from a social, ecological and economic perspective.

Sustainability in municipal food consumption

The City of Malmö has long worked to increase the proportion of sustainably produced food in municipal operations. Since 2010, the proportion of organic food in the municipality's food purchases has increased steadily from 27% to 59% in 2024.

Eliminating all forms of malnutrition

When it comes to malnutrition, Sweden has its major challenges linked to obesity. In Malmö, the proportion of the adult population with obesity has increased since 2000 from around 9 to around 16 per cent in 2022. This increase is also seen nationally. There are no major differences between women and men, but the proportion differs depending on the level of education. The lowest proportion of obesity is found in the group with post-secondary education. There are also differences in the prevalence of obesity between the different geographical areas of the city, from just over 9 per cent at the lowest to 28 per cent at the highest in 2022.

Obesity among children in Malmö is monitored among children in preschool class, year 4 and year 8. Since the 2016/2017 academic year, the proportion of children with obesity has increased in preschool class (from 3.6 to 6.7 per cent in the academic year 2023/2024) and year 4 (from 5.5 to 8.6 per cent in the academic year 2023/2024). In contrast, there is a decreasing trend for children in grade 8 (from 7.4 to 6.7 per cent in academic year 2023/2024). The vast majority of children and young people (more than 9 out of 10 young people) report eating dinner at home every day.

In Sweden, malnutrition is most common among older people and generally associated with illness. There are currently no comprehensive national statistics on the number of people diagnosed with malnutrition or at risk of malnutrition in both health and social services. Research shows that between 5-10 per cent of older people (65+) are estimated to be malnourished and as many as up to half of all patients admitted to hospitals and other care facilities (Cederholm and Bosaeus 2024).

The City of Malmö uses Senior Alert, which is a quality register where the risk of malnutrition is assessed, but the register does not capture all dimensions of malnutrition and few older people are included in the register. There are also no surveys, locally or nationally, that capture the prevalence of malnutrition among older people. At present, therefore, there are no reliable statistics on the development of malnutrition among older people in Malmö.

Indicators

2.1 BMI below 22 in special housing in Malmö, percentage (%)

2.2 Organically farmed arable land in Malmö, percentage (%)

2.3 Organic food, municipal operations in Malmö, percentage (%)

2.4 Obesity, children and adolescents in Malmö, percentage (%)

2.5 Obesity, adults in Malmö, percentage (%)

2.6 Dinner every day, children and adolescents in Malmö, percentage (%)

2.7 Total agricultural land area in Malmö, hectares

2.8 Overweight and obesity, adults in Malmö, percentage (%)

References

Cederholm, T. och Bosaeus, I. (2024). Malnutrition in adults in The new England journal of medicine. 2024; 391:155–165

Glokala Sverige (n.d.). Arbetsbok – Agenda 2030. Tillgänglig: https://fn.se/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Arbetsbok_Glokala_Sverige_2021.pdf

Miljöbarometern (n.d.). Miljöbarometern. Tillgänglig: Miljötillståndet i Malmö - Miljöbarometern - Malmö stad