Food or Famine

Question 7:Discuss the current threats and possible solutions to food security.  Within your answer identify the problems associated with the possible solutions.

Food security, according to the WHO, is “when all people at all times have access to sufficient, safe, nutritious food to maintain a healthy and active life”. The access to an adequate supply of food is vital for both the physical needs of the poor, and the advancement of human society by-in large. Currently there are three main threats to food security in both the developing and developed world, poverty natural disasters, and distribution issues.

While the impoverished spend between 50% and 80% of their income on food, the measures of poverty is impacted by where in the world they live. If the poor live in the developed world, they are able to (with relative ease) provide/procure enough food to feed themselves. This is because there is enough food, at a low enough cost, to feed the worlds population several times over. However, the developing world has been struck by countless manmade and natural disasters, which due to the weak nature of the pre-existing socio-political and economic structures, have magnified effects on the .

The main problem is that the food is not distributed equitably, even regionally and nationally. A problem evident in Ethiopia during the past two decades in which piles of domestically produced food and international food aid were seen rotting on the side of the road when hundreds of thousands of people were starving. This distribution problem has also exemplified by the fact that there has never been a famine in a country with democratically elected government and a free press. A phenomenon which can be seen in Ireland.

The problem of food security is highly debated and many of the worlds smartest minds are attempting to develop feasible solutions. I agree with several leading academics that the best way to solve food insecurity was increasing the amount of locally sourced, highly tied, humanitarian food aid.

Sources

http://www.ifad.org/hfs/facts.htm

http://www.who.int/trade/glossary/story028/en/

Images

http://www.scidev.net/global/food-security/feature/food-security-facts-and-figures.html

http://www.economist.com/blogs/baobab/2011/09/famine-horn-africa-0 http://politicsofpoverty.oxfamamerica.org/2014/06/food-aid-cause-conflict/