FOOD SECURITY: Definition and Indicators

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2. FOOD SECURITY: Definition and Indicators

Concern for achieving food security worldwide has been explicitly articulated since 1948, when the United Nations Declaration on Human Rights recognized the right to food as a basic human right Art. 25. Ever since, definitions of food security have varied considerably, encompassing distinct perspectives: a food-supply focus in the 1970s according to which food security refers to all people having enough food, followed by a focus on entitlements in the 1980s. This perspective was mainly driven by Sen’s work on structural and process-related factors that lead to inadequate distribution of food, causing food insecurity Sen, 1989. At the World Food Summit in 1996, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations FAO proposed a multidimensional definition of food security, referring to as a situation where “all people, at all times, have physical, social and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food to meet their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life” FAO, 2008. Hunger, argued scholars, is more a matter of poverty than of global food production Adams et al, 204; Sachs, 2009. In consideration of the above, food insecurity results when any of its underlying conditions - availability, access, utilization and stability - are not met Table 1. However, the task of securing food is by far simplistic and straightforward. For instance, access to food depends on production and consumption patterns of food products crops, non-crops, fish or livestock, among others, global and national food prices, trade relations, market dynamics or finance capital Ericksen et al., 2010. Food production, distribution and access is also scale-specific individual, household, national, regional and global and associated with political and institutional conditions policies, regulations or subsidies,environmental variables land, water and climate and socio-cultural norms and traditions e.g. gender or religion. The establishment of clear indicators is essential to track threats, measure improvement of food security status at different levels household, communitylocal, regional, national and global and establish sound risk management policies. Information on the status of, evolution of causes of changes in of food security in absolute and relative terms is fundamental for the design and implementation of food policies. Good indicators for food security also need to be sensitive to time scales e.g. distinguishing between short-term and long-term risks to food security and spatial scales geographical Pangaribowo et al., 2013. 9 Table 1. Four Dimensions of Food Security Physical Availability of food Food availability addresses the “supply side” of food security and is determined by the level of food production, stock levels and net trade. Economic and physical Access to food And adequate supply of food at the national or international level does not in itself guarantee household level food security. Concerns about insufficient food access have resulted in a greater policy focus on incomes, expenditures, markets and prices in achieving food security objectives. Food Utilization Utilization is commonly understood as the way the body makes the most of various nutrients in the food. Sufficient energy and nutrient intake by individuals is the result of good care and feeding practices, food preparation, diversity of the diet and intra-household distribution food. Combined with good biological utilization of food consumed, this determines the nutritional status of individuals. Stability of the other three dimensions over time Even if one’s food intake is adequate today, one is still considered food insecure if one has inadequate access to food on a periodic basis, risking a deterioration of your nutritional status. Adverse weather conditions, political instability, or economic factors unemployment, rising food prices may have an impact on one’s food security status. Source: FAO 2008 Following expert consultations, FAO 2013 developed a set of indicators to capture the four different pillars of food security Table 1, distinguishing between determinant indicators reflecting the “structural conditions that worsen food insecurity in absence of adequate policy interventions, including emergency assistance” and outcome indicators that refer to ‘“results in term of inadequate food consumption or anthropometric failures”. These indicators refer to: • Food availability: average dietary supply adequacy, food production index, share of energy and protein supply including protein from animal origin. • Physical access: paved roads percentage, rail lines and road density. • Economic access “affordability”: food price level index. 10 • Utilization access to improved water sources and sanitation facilities; percentage of children under 5 years of age underweight, wasted, stunted and percentage of adults underweight. • Inadequate access to food: prevalence of undernourishment and food inadequacy, depth of the food deficit, share of food expenditure of the poor. • Others: domestic food price volatility, per capita food production and supply variability, political stability including absence of violence, value of food imports over total merchandise exports, percentage of arable land equipped for irrigation, cereal import dependency ratio. 11 3. METHODOLOGY 3.1. Study Area