In the just concluded Asia Pacific Editors' Roundtable on Inequality and Hunger organised by the UNDP in Colombo, Sri Lanka, this writer told the gathering that Thailand has no challenge when it comes to hunger because the Thai media is generally uninterested and oblivious to the issue.

The hypothesis was later confirmed by a survey conducted by Panos, an international media and development NGO which looked into reporting by English-language newspapers in South Asia and two countries in Southeast Asia, including Thailand.

The survey covered the period between October 1 to December 20 in 2008 and revealed that The Nation and the Bangkok Post did not run a single story on hunger in that period.

Papers elsewhere in Pakistan, Nepal, Cambodia, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and India, where the survey was conducted, revealed many more positive signs, with most papers having reported on the issue to some extent.

The lack of attention to the issue by the Thai media, and not just English-language Thai newspapers, is because Thailand is the world's leading rice exporter - with some 6.5 million tonnes being shipped abroad annually, along with tonnes of frozen chicken and shrimp. The Kingdom is even the leading exporter of orchids.

So how can Thais possibly be facing hunger when food is aplenty and when people still believe there's fish in the river and rice in the field, or left over food in the trash bin?

Less-known or something of which most are unaware, according to the UNDP, is that statistics for 2004 revealed that 21 per cent of the Thai population overall remains undernourished and that 17.6 per cent of children under five are underweight. While progress has been made, two per cent of the Thai population lives on less than the equivalent of US$1 (Bt35) a day.

The matter is even worse, although there are virtually no statistics, when considering the plight of the 2 million or so migrant workers in Thailand, especially children of these people who live here without proper access to health care and nutrition.

Then come neighbouring countries like Cambodia, classified by the UNDP as the "least developed, low income food deficit country" where despite improvement, statistics show the overall prevalence of underweight children at 36 per cent, down from 45 per cent.

In Sri Lanka, nearly a third of the adult population is undernourished and between 14-29 per cent of children are underweight. In Nepal, nearly half of all children remain malnourished despite some improvements.

Globally, some 850 million people go hungry every day. Historian James Vernon wrote that: "As on every other day, on September 11, 2001, when terrorists murdered 2,973 people in the United States, almost twelve times that number, an estimated 35,000, were killed by hunger around the world."

Surely Thailand, as a major food exporter, and so-called kitchen of the world, can do more domestically and internationally. For that to happen, it will take greater awareness of the issue, and a sense of empathy that stretches beyond national borders.

Today, Thai media and the public consciousness are trapped between the awareness that although Thailand is a major food exporter, it is not a developed or rich country, so it is not sure what its international role should be.

The situation need not be this way and society can overcome its parochialism if it rethinks its role in the international community, and reaches out to feel the suffering of those without food.

As a major food exporter, Thailand definitely has a moral obligation to do more.

Note : The writer would like to thank the UNDP and Panos for the invitation to attend the roundtable discussion.