World Disaster Report 2011 FINAL

8/12/2019 World Disaster Report 2011 FINAL

1/127

2011Focus on hunger and malnutritionWorld

DisastersReport


2/127

AcknowledgementsAll rights reserved. Except for quotation in a review of the work, no part of this publicationmay be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means,electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permissionof the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. Tis publicationis copyright, but may be reproduced without fee for teaching purposes but not for resale.Formal permission is required for all such uses. For copying in any other circumstances, or forre-use in other publications, or for translation or adaptation, prior written permission must be

obtained from the publisher.

Te opinions expressed in this publication do not necessarily represent the official policy of theInternational Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies or of individual NationalRed Cross or Red Crescent Societies. Te designations used do not imply the expression of anyopinion on the part of the International Federation or National Societies concerning the legalstatus of a territory or of its authorities.

International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, 2011ISBN 978-92-9139-165-3

Editor: Lindsay Knight

Main contributors: Sue Armstrong, Mark Curtis, Randolph Kent, Dan Maxwell,Frdric Mousseau, Fred Pearce, Kate Sadler, Philip amminga and Geoff ansey


3/127

Contents

International Federation of Red Crossand Red Crescent Societies inside front cover

Acknowledgements 2

Introduction 8

Section IFocus on hunger and malnutrition

Chapter 1 Reworking the global food system 10

Box 1.1 Te voices of the hungry 12

Figure 1.1 Where do the hungry live? 14

Figure 1.2 Undernourishment data versus the MDG target 15


4/127

World Disasters Report 2011 Focus on hunger and malnutrition 54

Chapter 4 Achieving livelihood stability throughagriculture and social protection 94

Box 4.1 Te overlooked resilience of pastoralists 99

Figure 4.1 Commitments to agricultural aid, 19732008, 5-yearmoving averages and annual figures, constant 2007 prices 102

Box 4.2 Successful participatory plant breeding in low- andmiddle-income countries 104

Box 4.3 Te Machakos miracle 106

Box 4.4 Te potential productivity of women farmers 107

Box 4.5 Innovations, insurance and risk finance 113

Figure 4.2 R4 Rural Resilience Initiative 115

Box 4.6 Using Earth Observation data for the agricultural sector:crop insurance in China 116

Figure 4.3 Crop insurance data concept 117

Chapter 5 Responding to food insecurity andmalnutrition in crises 124

Figure 5.1 Natural disasters reported 19752009 126

Box 5.1 Somalia: the changing nature of conflict and the changinghumanitarian response 126

Box 5.2 Te Pakistan floods: chronic malnutrition exposed 130

Box 5.3 Changing policy on the treatment of severe acutemalnutrition 134

Box 2.3 Urban hunger and backyard agriculture 46

Figure 2.3 Comparison of the cost of a diet based on energy-onlyrequirements with the cost of a healthy diet 49

Box 2.4 Healthier food for people living with HIV and AIDS inLesotho 49

Figure 2.4a Percentage of infants exclusively breastfed for the firstmonths of life (20002006) 53

Figure 2.4b Increase in percentage of infants in 16 sub-Saharan Africancountries exclusively breastfed for the first six months oflife (around 1996 and around 2006) 53

Box 2.5 ackling micronutrient deficiency 54

Box 2.6 Rising hunger and malnutrition in the wealthy West 58

Chapter 3 Continued price instability questions relianceon global food markets 66

Figure 3.1 FAO food price index, 20012011 68

Box 3.1 Te impact of higher food prices on child nutrition 68Figure 3.2 Millet prices and admissions to the MSF treatment

programme, Maradi, Niger 69

Figure 3.3 Cereal production, utilization and stocks 72

Box 3.2 ackling speculation in financial markets 76

Figure 3.4 Increase in real prices of rice, Q2 2007 to Q2 2008 (%) 80

Box 3.3 Remittances and kinship at the forefront of the response 80

Figure 3.5 Remittances and rice prices, Bangladesh, June 2006December 2008 81

Figure 3.6 Comparison of price transmission between Burkina Fasoand India 82

Box 3.4 Ethiopias PSNP struggles to adjust to high food prices 83

Figure 3.7 Te relative value of different transfer modalities inGubalafto Woreda, Ethiopia, 20062008 84


5/127


able 4 otal amount of disaster estimated damage, by continent,by year and by level of human development (2001 to2010) in millions of US dollars (2010 prices) 211

able 5 otal number of reported disasters, by type ofphenomenon and by year (2001 to 2010) 212

able 6 otal number of people reported killed, by type ofphenomenon and by year (2001 to 2010) 214

able 7 otal number of people reported affected, by type ofphenomenon and by year (2001 to 2010), in thousands 216

able 8 otal amount of disaster estimated damage, by type ofphenomenon and by year (2001 to 2010) in millions ofUS dollars (2010 prices) 218

able 9 otal number of reported disasters, by type ofphenomenon, by continent and by level of humandevelopment (2001 to 2010) 220

able 10 otal number of people reported killed, by type ofphenomenon, by continent and by level of humandevelopment (2001 to 2010) 222

able 11 otal number of people reported affected, by type ofphenomenon, by continent and by level of humandevelopment (2001 to 2010), in thousands 224

able 12 otal amount of disaster estimated damage, by typeof phenomenon, by continent and by level of humandevelopment (2001 to 2010) in millions of US dollars(2010 prices) 226

able 13 otal number of people reported killed and affected bydisasters by country and territory (1991 to 2000; 2001 to2010; and 2010) 228

Index 236

Fundamental Principles inside back cover

Chapter 6 Getting it right united against hunger:a manifesto for change 148

Box 6.1 National Societies work to improve food security 150

Box 6.2 Monitoring with new technology 154

Box 6.3 La Via Campesina and food sovereignty 157

Box 6.4 Te role of the private sector in preventing hunger and

malnutrition 164

Box 6.5 Renegotiating the Food Aid Convention 169

Figure 6.1 otal food aid in grain equivalent and contributions toFAC in wheat equivalent from 1990 to 2005 170

able 6.1 FAC contributions and reported food aid in 20082009(thousand tonnes) 171

Section IIFacing the humanitarian challenges of the future:threats and opportunities 178

Figure II.1 Investments in local capacity and prevention 182

Figure II.2 Coverage of funding requirements by type of project 182

Figure II.3 Funding for reconstruction, relief and rehabilitation 184

Figure II.4 Te magnitude of climate-related vulnerability and impact 186

Annex Disaster data 198

able 1 otal number of reported disasters, by continent, by yearand by level of human development (2001 to 2010) 208

able 2 otal number of people reported killed, by continent, byyear and by level of human development (2001 to 2010) 209

able 3 otal number of people reported affected, by continent, byyear and by level of human development (2001 to 2010),in thousands 210


6/127


Tis edition of the World Disasters Reporthighlights that the issues of global foodsecurity, hunger and malnutrition go to the core of virtually all the major componentsand functions of the international system, from international trade to climate change,from water scarcity to scientific innovation.

We must tackle hunger and malnutrition and fast. Given the likelihood of the globalpopulation increasing by 3 billion by 2050, experts predict there may not be enoughfood to feed everyone. Hunger and malnutrition (both under- and overnutrition)are as much a threat to the worlds health as any disease.

National governments must acknowledge the right to food by implementing effective

hunger prevention programmes. Tey need to increase investments in agriculture in away that is fair, equitable and sustainable.

Both governments and donors should promote the participation of local farmers andacknowledge their wisdom and experience. More than half t he number of people whogo to bed hungry every night are women, and in many countries, at least 50 per centare small farmers who are too often ignored and unsupported. Recent research estimatesthat productivity on farms would increase by up to 20 per cent if gender discriminationwere to be eradicated.

Improving agricultural practices is only one of the solutions to prevent hunger. Moreglobal action is needed to tackle fundamental and related issues such as poverty andinequality; climate change and its effects on lower crop yields, land degradation anddesertification; and the depletion of, and growing competition for, vital resources ofland and water. Similarly, urgent action is necessary to stem the continuing rise in food

prices exacerbated by commodity speculation, to di scourage the use of la nd for biofuelrather than food production, and the acquisition of land in low-income countries byfinancial speculators.

Some might argue that all this is idea listic. However, this report features very concreteexamples of good practice in agriculture and research, social movements empoweringpeople, the use of new technologies and, at a global level, a more determined approachto prevent hunger and improve nutrition. Te risk is that such improvements will bereversed because governments (both rich and poor) fail to tackle vested interests, failto confront the major threats confronting the world over the next few decades and fa ilto protect and empower their most vulnerable citizens.

Decisive and susta ined actions will be ke y for a world free of hunger and malnutrition.It is possible.

Almost a billion hungryand malnourished:Challenges of a failing global food system

Te global food system is failing almost 1 billion hungry a nd malnourished people.What can and should be done to overcome this?

For decades, images of starving people have stirred the worlds conscience. Less vis-

ible have been the millions who experience chronic hunger today, nearly 1 billion oralmost one in s even people worldwide.

How can we deny that there is a huge ongoing crisis when a world that currently producesenough food to feed everyone fails to do so par tly due to increasing inequalities, foodand land becoming tradable commodities or commodities being sold to the highestbidder and thus violating everyones fundamental right to sufficient nutritious food?

Across the globe, it is the poor, the majority living in rural areas but increasing numbersin urban areas, who experience hunger. Tey are also the powerless, those without themeans to withsta nd the effects of climate change, increasing food and energy prices, andthe negative impacts of agribusiness, the global marketplace and unfair terms of trade(whether at local, national or international level). In some countries where hunger isendemic, governments strug gle to provide the ra nge of services needed to prevent hungerand malnutrition social protection, adequate potable water and sanitation, infrastructure,

education, support for women a nd, most importa ntly, employment and empowerment.o a large extent, todays food crisis has caught the world by surprise. For some decadesthere was a slow decline in the number of hungry people. Agriculture has never beenhigh on the development agenda; in real terms, the share of overseas development aidto agriculture fell from just 18 per cent in the 1980s to less tha n 4 per cent in 2007. Tenumbers of hungry and malnourished people began to rise in the mid-1990s and thensoared during the 2008 food price crisis. Tere are dire predictions of the number ofhungry people increasing to well over 1 billion as many staple food prices continue to rise.

One of the targets of the first Millennium Development Goal is to halve the propor-tion of people who suffer from hungerby 2015. In many countries, there is little hopeof meeting this rat her modest goal without an investment of around US$ 75 billion inagriculture and social protection.

Te flipside of the coin is overnutrition. Well over 1 billion people in low- and middle-

income as well as in high-income countries are overweight or obese. As people changetheir diets from traditiona l foods to processed and calorie-dense foods, they are experi-encing the health effects notably cardiovascular problems, diabetes and other lifest yleillnesses of too much of the wrong type of food. Globally, one of the ten major causesof death is heart disease.

Bekele GeletaSecretary General
http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/pdf/MDG%20Report%202010%20En%20r15%20-low%20res%2020100615%20-.pdf%22%20/l%20%22page=13%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlinkhttp://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/pdf/MDG%20Report%202010%20En%20r15%20-low%20res%2020100615%20-.pdf%22%20/l%20%22page=13%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlinkhttp://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/pdf/MDG%20Report%202010%20En%20r15%20-low%20res%2020100615%20-.pdf%22%20/l%20%22page=13%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlinkhttp://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/pdf/MDG%20Report%202010%20En%20r15%20-low%20res%2020100615%20-.pdf%22%20/l%20%22page=13%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink


7/127


C

HAPTE

R

1

10

C

HAPTE

R

1Reworking theglobal food system

Although the world produces enough food to feed everyone, in 2011 almost 1 billionchildren, men and women go to bed hungry every night. Millions of these, particularlyyoung children, suffer the dire effects of undernutrition. David Nabarro, the UnitedNations (UN) Secretary-Generals Special Representative for Food Security and Nutri-

tion, says: Current levels of undernutrition reflect a massive and avoidable disasterfor millions of the worlds citizens. It is inexcusable and morally unacceptable that thissituation persists to this day (interview with Nabarro, 2011).

Hunger and food insecurity involve not only a lack of sufficient food for a healthylife, but also the anxiety associated with meeting future food needs including duringthe lean season (Maxwell, 1995). Hunger and malnutrition increase peoples vulner-ability to shocks and crises, weaken their capacity to produce food and/or to accessaffordable, nutritious food and undermine their health and future potential. Severemalnutrition permanently reduces childrens capacity to learn, as Chapter 2 illustrates.Consequently, providing sufficient nutritious food to everyone poses a major chal-lenge for all concerned with ensuring peoples well-being including governments andhumanitarian agencies.

Tis edition of the World Disasters Reportanalyses the challenges, complexities andcauses of hunger and malnutrition and advocates some solutions. Tey range fromstronger support for smallholder farmers to improving regulation of financial specula-tors in order to calm the increasing volatility of food prices around the world, fromadvocating sustainable agriculture to empowering rural and urban communities, andfrom social protection schemes to strengthening the work of international institutions.It also examines the response to food insecurity and malnutrition in crises, and thechallenges and constraints to improving these responses.

Some 30 years ago, Amartya Sen, Nobel laureate for economics in 1998, wrote: Star-vation is the characteristic of some people not havingenough food to eat. It is not thecharacteristic of there beingnot enough food to eat (Sen, 1981; original emphasis).Inequalities are built into the production, distribution and pricing of food everywhere.

Tis introductory chapter analyses a food system that is failing to deliver a safe, secure,sustainable, sufficient and nutritious diet for all with equity.

Business as usual is not an option if this aim is to be achieved. As United States Secre-tary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said (repeating what other politicians have saidin slightly different ways over the decades): Te question is not whether we canendhunger, its whether we will (US State Department, 2009; emphasis added).

Photo page:Masa

amid and soher fa

PastapIndianPrade

membDevelo

which local w

local fand ctheir w

throug

Geo


8/127


Te majority of the hungry are in the Asia Pacific region, especially the Indian sub-continent, and in sub-Saharan Africa (see Figure 1.1). Most of the hungry live in ruralareas. As a policy report prepared for the United Kingdom government states: Half ofthe worlds undernourished people, three-quarters of Africas malnourished children,and the majority of people living in absolute poverty can be found on small farms(Foresight Project, 2011).

A key problem is that rural people are disadvantaged. As Niels Rling of WageningenUniversity and Research Centre in the Netherlands points out:

...Small-scale African farmers... have only very few and small opportuni-ties African farmers have, on the whole, been able to produce food inkeeping with the very rapid population growth over the past 50 years. Teyhave done this with little use of external inputs or science-based knowledge,with little support from government (in fact, agriculture is a source of rev-enue for most African governments) and in the face of cheap food imports,climate change, conflict and disease (Rling, 2009).

A substantial and growing number of the worlds hungry also lives in urban and peri-urban areas. Te 2010 edition of the World Disasters Reportreveals that 4.1 millionurban poor in Kenya were classified as highly food insecure in March 2009, as slum

dwellers were affected by rising food prices, disasters and crises that forced them toreduce their food intake. It indicates that the lessons learned from the World FoodProgrammes operations in urban areas during the food price crisis point to restrictedfood access as the trigger, rather than insufficient availability.

People in high-income countries do not all escape hunger (see Box 2.6). Te UnitedStates Department for Agriculture (USDA) reports that in 2010 about US$ 68 billion

Hunger persistsAlmost 40 years ago, the assessment prepared for the UN World Food Conference in1974, following severe famines in Africa, noted: Te food crisis of the pas t two yearshas drawn attention dramatically to both the interdependence of production, trade,stocks and prices and the serious unpreparedness of the world as a whole to meet thevagaries of the weather (UN, 1974). Little has changed.

Tere has been progress in feeding more people than ever before even as the worldspopulation has grown by around 50 per cent since the mid-1970s. Even so, the number

of undernourished people in the world was higher in 2010 925 million accordingto the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) than in theearly 1970s (FAO, 2011a). Tere was a record peak of more than 1 billion hungrypeople in 2009 following dramatic food price rises in 20072008. Tis figure sub-sequently decreased, but at the time of writing, prices are rising and the number ofhungry people looks likely to increase again.

In addition to farming and weaving, I alsofished. My catch was good. Now, when I make acatch, about 2 to 3 kapoaka[3 kapoakaequals1 kilogram] I dont want to cook them... I walkto the market in Manambaro to sell them... Thenwith the money I make, I purchase a kapoakaofrice or cassava. Obviously, I dont make muchand therefore I am not able to provide enoughfood to nourish my children (Panos, 2007).

In Zambia, Agatha Akakandelwa workslong hours to feed t he 21 people in her charge including 14 of her grandchildren who areAIDS orphans. She farms maize, cassava andvegetables in two separate fields located some

distance from her home. In addition, shea variety of other work in order to feedfamily, including labouring on other peofarms, making scones and brewing beer toShe does not get any external support despite her hard work, still struggles toher family.

I really dont feel good during the hutime. I really pity the children. As an a

can go all day without eating and then gand go to the field the next day. But I get concerned for the children during the hutimes I am always in the fields working tofeed my family (Concern Worldwide web

Who are the hungry? They are people like Flor-ence Nakaweesi and her six children who liveon a smallholding in rural Uganda. She cannot

afford the seeds or implements to make hersmall plot productive, nor earn enough fromworking her neighbours land to feed her fam-ily. Sometimes she only serves them hot water.At least the water will put something in theirstomachs until later when we might find somefood to eat before bed, she says. I feel as ifmy life has no meaning... Because I cant getany food, this is all I can give my children tokeep them from crying for a while (ConcernWorldwide website).

They are people like Basran, who shares asmall house on the shores of Manchar Lake inPakistan with 20 members of her extended fam-

ily and describes their lives as daily death.The water used to be sweet, that is why wegot a lot from it, she says. But today the lakeis overfished and polluted, and Basran and herfamily are constantly hungry (Panos website).

To try to survive, we even eat bad fish[though] we feel that our insides are on fire... If wecatch a bird, we even eat that now, says Basran.

And they are people like Yeai from Yunnanprovince in south-western China, who ate treeroots when his supply of grains was exhausted(Panos website).

Soarahy, 50, from Petriky in Madagas-car, is also struggling to feed her family. Inthe past, the rice harvest was a special mo-ment and fish catches provided more thanthe family could eat. Nowadays, she says,survival is the primary thought that each in-dividual has and her own stress and tensionare evident. All her traditional sources of live-lihood farming, fishing and making tsihy(woven mats) are precarious. Even when

she catches fish, she cannot afford to eatit, and sells it in order to buy staple foods.While she insists people do not want to sitand wait for donations, she cannot foreseealternative livelihood options.

Box 1.1 The voices of the hungry


9/127


C

HAPTE

R

1

was spent through its Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program also known asfood stamps to reach just over 40 million people compared to US$ 250 million(1969 prices) in 1969 that benefited some 2.9 million people (USDA, 2010).

Will the situation improve in the future? Unfortunately, on current trends, the prog-nosis is not reassuring. Halving theproportionof people experiencing extreme povertyand hunger the first of the UNs Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) is veryunlikely to be achieved (see Figures 1.2 and 1.3). It is also far too modest a target and

less than the commitment at the World Food Summit in 1996, which was to halvethe numberof hungry people. Since the 1974 World Food Conference, when HenryKissinger stated that within a decade no man, woman or child will go to bed hungry,governments have repeatedly made solemn promises to end hunger, but have failed todeliver (see Box 1.2).

Asia and the Pacific578 million

High-income countries19 million

Near East and North Africa37 million

Latin America and the Caribbean53 million

Sub-Saharan Africa239 million

Total: 925 million people (as of 2010)

Source:FAO,2011b

Figure 1.1Where do the hungry live?1200

1000

800

600

400

200

0

30%

25%

20%

15%

10%

5%

0%

Millions

1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015 2020

878

24

19

853

16

845

14

825

14

857

13

8

873

15

1020

13.6

915

13.5

925

Number of hungry peopl e Percentage Path to MDG 1

Source:Oxfam,2010

Figure 1.2Undernourishment data versus the MDG target

Already met MDG 1 or very close to meeting the target

Progress achieved (199092 to 200507)

Progress sufficient to reach MDG 1 if prevailing trends persistProgress insufficient to reach MDG 1 if prevailing trends persistNo progress or deteriorationNot relevant prevalence of hunger was below 5% in 1990Missing or insufficient data

Note:Target 1Cof the first Millenium DevelopmenyGoal seeksto halve, between1990 and2015, the proportionof people who suffer from hunger.The calculationor progresscompares the latest available country-level informationon the prevalence of undern(200507)with the ratesthat existedin199092 (the base periodfor the hunger target).The projectionfor 2015 assumesthat the trendsbetween bothperiods continue inthe future.High-income countriesare not considered.Source:FAO,2011

Figure 1.3Progress towards Millennium Development Goal 1: Hunger target


10/127


C

HAPTE

R

1

16

Bigger challenges aheadCreating a well-fed world will be even more challenging in the face of climate change,growing competition for resources, including land and water (see Box 1.3), increasinginequality within most countries (Sutcliffe, 2004) and continued high levels of publicspending on research and development that focus on perfecting weapons of destruc-tion rather than facilitating the creation and maintenance of resilient food systems aspart of securing long-term human s ecurity (Abbott et al., 2006).

It is not clear how quickly climate change will affect food and farming. Many coun-

tries and regions seem to be experiencing far greater variability in weather patterns andmore extremes floods, droughts, storms, heatwaves and cold spells which togetherwith changes in growing seasons affect food production. According to the FAO:

An aspect of the consequences in terms of food security, specifically, ofthe impacts of global warming includes but is not limited to the following:changes in the growing seasons length as well as the timing and amount ofprecipitation; changes in the snowfall season, the runoff season, the rainyseason, the timing of flood recession farming, the hunting season, the fishingseason, the water season; changes in the timing of outbreaks and increases invector-borne diseases; rice farming following the replacement of saline waterintrusion in rivers by freshwater after onset of rains (e.g. Mekong River);extended seasonal food crisis because of long-lasting drought conditions (e.g.Monga in Bangladesh), and so forth. Speculation about the foreseeableimpacts of changes in seasonality is virtually boundless (FAO, 2009).

Effective water management is central to maintaining food supplies. Yet many currentmethods of producing food are using unsustainable freshwater sources, such as fossilaquifers in the Arabian Peninsula, or sources threatened by climate change, such as gla-cial melt waters. Others use rivers that cross borders, where disputes may arise over damsand abstraction rates. Te potential for conflict arising from disputes about water isgrowing; this adds to the complexity of tackling future food production (Brown, 2011).

Malnutrition spreadsMalnutrition is far more widespread than hunger. As explained in Chapter 2, at least1 billion people are undernourished and lack key vitamins and minerals, while at thesame time a staggering 1.5 billion people are overweight or obese (see Box 2.1 for defi-nitions). Te latter groups are likely to suffer long-term, debilitating and costly healthproblems: from heart disease and various cancers to diabetes (WHO, 2011). Te risksto health of obesity are not only a problem for high-income countries or for the moreaffluent in low- and middle-income countries, but increasingly for poor countries andpoor people in high-income countries.

Te challenge is to create a food system that will enable everyone to be food secure ina sustainable and fair way. Tis requires action beyond the food system itself, as wellas within it.

Everyone has a right to a standard of livingadequate for the health and well-being of him-self and his family, including food... (Univer-sal Declaration of Human Rights, 1948).

States Parties... recognize the fundamen-

tal right of everyone to be free from hunger...(International Covenant on Economic, Socialand Cultural Rights, 1966).

Every man, woman and child has the inalien-able right to be free from hunger and malnutritionin order to develop fully and maintain their physi-cal and mental faculties. Society today alreadypossesses sufficient resources, organisational abil-ity and technology and hence the competence toachieve this objective. Accordingly, the eradica-tion of hunger is a common objective of all thecountries of the international community, espe-cially of the developed countries and others in aposition to help (World Food Conference, 1974).

We pledge to act in solidarity to ensurethat freedom from hunger becomes a reality(International Conference on Nutrition, 1992).

We, the Heads of State and Government,or our representatives, gathered at the World

Food Summit at the invitation of the Food andAgriculture Organization of the United Na-tions, reaffirm the right of everyone to have ac-cess to safe and nutritious food, consistent wit hthe right to adequate food and the fundamen-

tal right of everyone to be free from hunger.We pledge our political will and our com-

mon and national commitment to achievingfood security for all and to an ongoing effortto eradicate hunger in all countries, with animmediate view to reducing the number of un-dernourished people to half their present levelno later than 2015.

...Food should not be used as an instru-ment for political and economic pressure. Wereaffirm the importance of international coop-eration and solidarity as well as the necessityof refraining from unilateral measures not inaccordance with the international law and the

Charter of the United Nations and that endan-ger food security (World Food Summit, 1996).

Source:Tansey and Rajotte, 2008

Box 1.2 Global aspirations, still unmet

All people have the right to water and sanita-tion. The obligation that water and sanitationare available, accessible, affordable, acceptableand safe for all without discrimination at all times,must be progressively realized by states within

available resources. States must take conand targeted steps towards ensuring universcess to water and sanitation. Where domessources are insufficient for such efforts, stateseek international cooperation and assista

Box 1.3 Human rights to water and sanitation


11/127


However, there are solutions to improving the global food system, as will be seen

throughout this report. Teir exact nature will vary between countries due to differ-ing circumstances and conditions. Some involve action at local, regional or nationallevel, while others require interregional and international engagement. Nonetheless, allrequire the existence of sustainable, healthy and equitable food systems as the centralfocus of agriculture and water use.

Safety nets and public policies for hungry people

In Jharkhand, a poor province in eastern India, the monsoon rains were delayed in2009. For many farmers, the initial rice planting failed. What was growing was notexpected to yield well. However, a group of farmers in Jashpur village, not far fromRanchi, the state capital, seemed surprisingly unconcerned. Why? Te promise from

The Special Rapporteur on the human rightto safe drinking water and sanitati on has beenworking since 2008 to raise awareness aboutthe requirements of the human rights to wa-ter and sanitation. She carries out this work

through thematic research, country visanalyse the implementation of the rights domestic context, work on the MDGs ancollection of good practices.

These human rights and the correspondingobligations were endorsed by the UN GeneralAssembly in July 2010 and by the UN HumanRights Council in September 2010.

They are equally relevant in times of dis-aster, and guaranteeing the right to water andsanitation is essential for addressing hunger andmalnutrition. Safe water and sanitation have adirect impact on health. Disease outbreaks in the

aftermath of disasters are frequently attributedto the lack of safe water and sanitation. Unsafesanitation, which allows human excreta to leakinto the environment, can also pollute agriculturalproducts, further contributing to malnutrition anddisease.

Understanding water and sanitation as hu-man rights provides a legally binding frameworkwhich adopts a holistic understanding of access,prohibits discrimination, empowers people anddemands accountability for violations. The re-quirements of availability, quality, accessibility,affordability and acceptability can be further de-scribed as follows:

Availability: The water supply for eachperson must be sufficient for personal and do-mestic uses. Likewise, a sufficient number ofsanitation facilities should be available. Inthe context of emergencies and disasters, theSphere Handbooksuggests a minimum provi-sion of between 7.5 and 15 litres of water perperson per day, as larger volumes may not beavailable to cover all personal and domesticneeds. However, the amounts provided shouldbe gradually improved with time.

Quality: Water has to be safe. It has tobe of such quality that it does not pose a threatto human health. Sanitation facilities must behygienically and technically safe to use. Toensure hygiene, access to water for cleansingand hand washing is essential. Preventing dis-ease is an obligation of states, including dur-

ing emergency situations when it has a directimpact on the incidence of malnutrition.

Physical accessibility: Water and sanitationservices must be accessible to everyone in the house-hold or its vicinity on a continuous basis. Physical se-curity must not be threatened by accessing facilities.

Affordability: Services have to be af-fordable. Realizing access to water must notcompromise the ability to pay for other essen-

tial needs guaranteed by other human rightssuch as food, housing and healthcare.

Acceptabili ty: Sanitation facilities, inparticular, have to be culturally acceptable.This will often require separate male and fe-male facilities. Also, facilities should be con-structed to offer privacy and digni ty.

In putting human rights into practice, prior-ity is always given to those who are disadvan-taged or excluded. For instance, special atten-tion will be needed to ensure that people withdisabilities have access to water and sanitationto protect their health and dignity. Also, thesecurity of women and girls is often threatenedwhen accessing water points and sanitation fa-cilities. To address the needs of these and othervulnerable groups, they must be consulted andgiven opportunities to participate in the designand implementation of interventions. Othergroups potentially requiring special attentionmight include minorities, single-headed house-holds, unaccompanied or separated children,and the elderly.

Human rights also emphasize accountabili-ty and the rights to information and t ransparen-cy. In humanitarian relief efforts, this translatesinto requirements for making information pub-licly available, including information on who isresponsible for these services and where peo-ple can lodge complaints of abuse or neglect,or instances where their rights to water andsanitation were violated.

Village

water of KebWater

resourlivelihosecurit

countrscarcitcause

Jos


12/127


the government to provide a minimum of 100 days work at the minimum wage (100rupees per day) for a member of those families affected by the probable poor harvest.Tey would then be able to buy food. Te Indian government maintains stocks ofwheat and rice to meet times such as these as part of its National Rural EmploymentGuarantee Scheme.

Tis programme is one of the ways, like the subsidized food programme in the UnitedStates, by which governments can provide a safety net for people who cannot affordenough food. India also has the largest number of hungry people in the world more

than in all of sub-Saharan Africa. ackling this problem requires more than a pro-gramme of government handouts in the case of emergencies. As Jayati Ghosh, pro-fessor of economics at Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi argues, it requiresdrastically reducing the high levels of income inequality prevailing in the country(Ghosh, 2011; see Box 1.4).

On 21 April 2011, a Supreme Court benchcomprising Justice Dalveer Bhandari and Jus-tice Deepak Verma heard a petition from thePeoples Union for Civil Liberty on streamlining

the public distribution system that provides foodto the hungry. What Justice Bhandari obser vedwhile listening to the arguments was a reflectionof the paradox of plenty that prevails in India.

In a country that has emerged as the worldsfifth largest economy with a growth rate of al-most 9 per cent, more than 700 million peopleremain food insecure. See what the stark con-tradictions in your whole approach are, JusticeBhandari told the Additional Solicitor General.You say you are a powerful economy. Youhave a bumper crop this year and our godowns[warehouses] are full, and it is a happy situa-tion, no doubt. When you have your godowns

full and people are starving, what is the ben-efit? You cannot have two Indias.

This was not the first time that the SupremeCourt had chided the government for its inac-tion in feeding the hungry. Historically, through

a mass-based public distribution system a net-work of ration shops spread across the areaslacking enough food India has provided essen-tial grains at subsidized prices to both poor and

non-poor populations. But swamped by rampantcorruption, leakages, spoilage and distributionbottlenecks, such food has remained outside thereach of a majority of those who need it.

Indias public distribution scheme techni-cally caters to 316 million people who arein the below the poverty line category. Addthe above the poverty line category and thescheme is supposed to provide food to morethan 900 million people. But the way the belowthe poverty line (which should be dubbed thestarvation line) has been drawn, the distribu-tion scheme fails to provide them with their mini-mal daily food intake. If the scheme had been

even partially effective, there is no reason whyIndia should be saddled with the largest popula-tion of hungry people in the world.

Despite four ministries administering 22programmes to alleviate hunger and poverty,

Box 1.4 Indias food security law will not feed the hungry

the budget allocation for which is enhancedalmost every year, the poor still go hungry andhundreds of children die every day in Indiafrom malnourishment.

It is primarily because of the inability of thestate agencies to feed the nation that India re-tains the dubious distinction of having the larg-est population of hungry people in the world.This is reflected in the 2010 multi-dimensional

poverty estimates developed by the Oxford Pov-erty and Human Development Initiative for theUN Development Programme (OPHI website).Eight states Bihar, Chhatisgarh, Jharkhand,Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Rajasthan, UttarPradesh and West Bengal have more desper-ately poor people than the 26 poorest Africannations. In 2006, India ranked 66thin the Glo-bal Hunger Index prepared for 88 countries bythe International Food Policy Research Institute(Wiesmann, 2006). The low ranking of India inthe Global Hunger Index is despite the distribu-tion scheme, which is designed to provide asafety net for the vulnerable sections of society.

According to the recommendations of theIndian Council of Medical Research, eachable-bodied adult needs a minimum of 14 kilo-grams (kg) of grains a month. Given that anaverage family comprises five members, thehousehold allocation would be 70kg. The dis-tribution scheme at present provides only 35kgof wheat and rice to each family, so the hungryremain perpetually hungry.

In 2009, soon after being sworn in, thegovernment announced its decision to pass anational food security act, in fulfilment of theruling partys electoral promise to providefood to all. After much deliberation and manyobjections, the draft was submitted to thegovernment.

The scope of the proposed food securitylegislation remains restricted to 46 per cent of

the population in rural areas and 28 pein the urban centres.

The proposed act cannot be an iso latetivity. It has to be integrated with various programmes and policy initiatives to ethat hunger is eradicated. To achieve thjective, the food security plan should essenaim at adopting a five-point approach:

Public policies for zero hunge

combination of structural policies to adthe real causes of hunger and poverty, sppolicies to meet the household needs forterm access to nutritious food, and locacies that are informed by local needs and on the concept of sustainable livelihoods

Sustainable livelihoods: In a cowhere agriculture is the mainstay of the omy, the strengthening of low external-sustainable agricultural practices is paramThis includes revitalizing the natural resbase, restoring groundwater levels and ping higher incomes to farmers.

Public distribution system: The prclassification of below and above the poline needs to be revisited. Instead, the finof the National Commission on Enterprthe Unorganised Sector, that 836 millionple in India spend less than 20 rupees (4cents) a day on food, should be the crifor a meaningful food-for-all programmeaverage ration of 35kg per family also nto be revised upwards, coupled with the to expand the food basket to include cocereals and pulses.

Food grain banks: The restructurithe public distribution system has to be acpanied by the setting-up of food grain bathe village and taluka(sub-district) levelslong-term food security plan cannot resustainable unless the poor and the hubecome partners in hunger prevention. are ample examples of successful mod


13/127


Wherever you go, it is the poor who are hungry. It is the poor who suffer most from

abrupt price rises, poor harvests and the like as they lack the assets which providepeople with the resilience to ride out such times.

One problem in India, according to the Deccan Development Society and others, isthe neglect of small farmers especially women who are the main producers of localfoods and traditional grains such as millet and sorghum. Te Deccan DevelopmentSociety has been working with poor, illiterate dalit(untouchable) women to help themto restore the fertility and productivity of the almost barren lands they received fromthe government as a result of land reforms and to have the means to communicateabout their needs (see Box 1.5). It also works to get the government to include themillets and sorghums, which grow so well in drier areas such as the Deccan, into thenational food distribution system and to consider actions to promote their productionand consumption as a priority.

traditional grain banks (e.g., the golasystemin Bihar), which need to be replicated througha nationwide programme involving self-helpgroups and non-governmental organizations.

International commitments: Glo-bal commitments such as the World Trade

Organization (WTO) agreements, free tradeagreements and various bilateral trade deals and neo-liberal economic policies should notbe allowed to disrupt the food security plan,nor displace farming communities and j eopard-ize national food security.

The pigeon peas are waist high and the sor-ghum soars above the head of Narsamma,working on her familys farm in Pastapur villageon the Deccan plateau in Andhra Pradesh. It isa semi-arid area in the heart of India often hitby drought. Most farmers here work on smallplots on marginal lands.

Narsamma is one of around 5,000 wom-en, mostly from the dalitor untouchable caste,

who have become organized into womenssanghams(voluntary village-level associationsof the poor) over the past 20 years. The Dec-can Development Society and sanghams inabout 80 villages have been working together

to build local food sovereignty. They are im-proving dryland farming and building up thecapacity and autonomy of these marginalizedpeoples. Activities include saving seeds of lo-cal varieties of crops and creating seed andlocal grain banks that offer an alternative localpublic distribution service in times of need.

But the women felt that this work was notenough. They wanted to share their knowledge,

skills and experience with each other and morewidely. It was clear to them that their voiceswere not heard by the outside world.

Although the women were no t literate, P.V.Satheesh, the Deccan Development Societys

Box 1.5 Saving seeds and speaking out: the womenof Medak district, Andhra Pradesh, India

co-founder and director, felt that should not bea barrier to communication. It was this under-standing, and the realization that with modernvideo technology they could more easily begiven a voice, that took some of them, includ-ing Narsamma, beyond work on their ownfarms.

At some point of time [late 1990s], saysNarsamma, the elders of the sanghamswere

discussing that whenever we want to say some-thing and whenever we want to show some-thing, why is it that we must always dependupon outsiders. Why cant we teach our ownpeople, our own children about these things?And when these discussions were happeningthere was a programme called learning with-out frontiers. So in that meeting with UNESCO[UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Or-ganization] there was a discussion about it andthe UNESCO people were saying that this canonly be done with people who have literacyand our people cant even read and write.How can they [these women] do it? So our

people argued saying that if that is the case wehave to constantly depend upon outside peo-ple, why cant our people learn and teach themand lets see what happens. And t hats how westarted learning and they [the elders] said thatif our people learn theyll be accessible to us,theyll be under our control.

Id never seen any cameras in my life be-fore I started becoming a part of DDS [DeccanDevelopment Society]. For us even coming forsanghammeetings was a great thing and sohow could we think of becoming cameraper-sons and film-makers? says Manjula, fromEedulapalle village. But trained in filming theywere, and despite initial scepticism from othersin the village, produced remarkable results.

Initially [other] people [in the village]thought we were incapable of learning andevery week [when] we used to come here for

practice, they used to make fun of us. can you people whove never gone tschool, what can you do? But once I leaI had the camera in my home in the villagsix months of time. During that time I filmnumber of things. Sowing the fields, haing the fields, various agriculture operavarious festivals, etc. And when our psaw that, then they started appreciating

fact, the big landlord of the village, heme once that I never thought you wouanything like this but now I see that yodoing a great work, says Laxmamma,Humnapur village.

It was important for them to set the agand decide what should be filmed, what sneeded to be told.

We do issues that concern us our ping systems, our seeds and what is our farsituation are they doing well, are they not well? Why? These are the kind of films we mWe dont do other kinds of films. In fact, aftfinished our training we did take an oat

we would not go into commercial kind omaking, says Narsamma. In 2001 the gwhich now numbers 20 (17 film-makers aworking on radio with their own small conity radio station), together formed the DeDevelopment Societys Community Media

We do it because there are plenty ople who do the other kind of films and thhardly anyone who does our kind of filmsour people, our communities there is nowho listens to them, who would like to ptheir issues. And therefore we decidedits our duty to project their issues, make heard. And there are so many things wheis our seeds, whether it is our farming, whit is our festivals, whether it is our langall these are things that are being lost.therefore we want to capture them and pfront of people, adds Laxmamma.


14/127


C

HAPTE

R

1

24

includes a section on farmers rights and the need to maintain this diversity in situ, asa key element of future food security.

Human nutrition has come to depend upon very few crops as its staples. Just threecrops rice, wheat and maize account for more than half the energy intake fromplants. Another six sorghum, millet, potatoes, sweet potatoes, soybean and sugar take the total to more than 75 per cent, while 90 per cent of humanitys calorie intakecomes from just 30 crops. Around 120 crops are important nationally in differentcountries for example, teff in Ethiopia while some 7,000 plants have been grown

or gathered as food out of an estimated 30,000 edible plants. Te vast majority ofresearch, however, has focused on just a few.

Given the key role of those few plants, it is particularly important that the diversitywithin major crops is conserved effectively, available for use, and managed wiselynoted a global survey by FAO (FAO, 1998). Much of this diversity has been developedand maintained by small farmers, but it was the replacement of these local or farmersvarieties or landraces by improved and/or exotic varieties and species that was themajor cause of genetic erosion in all regions except Africa (FAO, 1998). A secondsurvey noted that the diversity found in farmers fields is still largely inadequatelydocumented and managed (FAO, 2010).

Much of the analysis in the continuing debate over food security examines neither theroot causes of hunger nor the complexities and interactions of poverty and power. Areport on chronic vulnerability in the Sahel, for example, found that much of the anal-ysis tended to divide vulnerability to drought into immediate and structural issues,and that the latter were largely ignored. By contrast, the reality of food-related vulner-ability in the Sahel was found to be complex and nuanced... [it] can be influenced bygender, ethnic group and generation issues, and by contemporary and historical socialprocesses that are often not analysed and not explained (rench et al., 2007).

If we want to see an end to hunger and malnutrition, we must think about the struc-tures and systems as well as what we eat. Shifts in consumption from grain-based dietstowards diets rich in meat, dairy and fats have been promoted by vested interests andare seen as desirable. Further pressures arise from governments and agribusiness to useland for biofuel production, as discussed in Chapter 4.

Overproduction and saturated marketsGiven that 15 per cent of the worlds population now goes to bed hungry, it is ironicthat excessive production has driven so much innovation in high-income countriesfood systems during the past half-century. Te necessary and successful strategiesto increase production after the Second World War in Europe and North America,

Getting to the root of the problem

Te problems of chronic hunger and malnutrition are deep-seated and not amenableto quick technological fixes. Tey are built into the very structure of todays global foodsystem and their solution requires political, economic, legal and social innovation andsystemic changes if we are to create a well-fed world for all.

Formulating an adequate policy response requires some understanding of the historythat has brought us to where we are now. Te history of food is very much a historyof human expansion and imperial conquest of the rich seeking exotic foods andspices, and (for the last few hundred years) of Western powers restructuring much ofthe world to suit their needs. Tese are the structures that have led to todays com-modity production and trade patterns, which are now dominated by relatively fewcorporations.

Te food system is a biological one which requires a healthy biosphere to function. Teloss of biological and agricultural biodiversity that gives resilience to biological systems

has increased since the 1970s. It has led to various international agreements such as the1992 Convention on Biological Diversity and the 2001 binding International reatyon Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture. Te convention promotes theconservation, sustainable use and sharing of the benefits from biodiversity in general.Te international treaty focuses on plant agricultural biodiversity, recognizes the rolethat small farmers around the world have had in creating and maintaining it, and

It has not just been an empowering processfor the women involved, but also affected theircommunities and state policies and reachedcommunities worldwide.

Professionally we had done films on BT cot-ton [a genetically engineered variety of cotton]and our films played a big role in getting Mon-santo banned from the state of Andhra Pradesh.And that was a great triumph. And that this film

also got translated into several languages is aprofessional high for me. And, personally, myfather is dead so I have the responsibility for myfamily. I was able to educate my brother, I wasable to perform the marriage of my sister, andall this came because my own awareness andthinking developed when I became a film-mak-er. This was a personal great, says Tammali.

Narsamma says, We were completelyunrecognized people and now our films arebeing shown in film festivals, we are gettingawards, we are mixing with [people at the fes-tivals], we are being invited to those kind ofthings, so thats for me a very big thing that hashappened to us. We have trained people fromdifferent organizations, as well as studentsfrom Hyderabad University. So we have been

able to do a lot of that. And we also share alot of films that we make with lots and lots oforganizations, [in] several parts of South Asia;since we started doing this, many other farm-ing women learnt this skill from us and theywere also inspired by us to do this. And wehave also been to Peru and have t rained someindigenous people there.


15/127


C

HAPTE

R

1

26

C

HAPTE

R

1Farming in high-income countries made maximum use of technology and machin-ery based on cheap fossil fuels and minimized the use of labour. Such an industrialapproach, focusing on one or two attributes of the farming system such as labour pro-ductivity, grain yield or animal production, led to increasingly monocultural produc-tion systems. Te result was an emptying of the countryside and the squeezing out ofsmall farmers, leaving a landscape very different from that still found in many low- andmiddle-income countries.

Misdirected research and development

Tis industrial approach has also become the iconic image of what development is allabout. It is this image that politicians and policy-makers around the world aspire to aview largely shared by the bilateral and multilateral aid agencies. Much development pol-icy has focused on industrialization and has neglected rural and agricultural developmentover the last 30 years. Attention has shifted away from agriculture in the big developmentagencies, such as the World Bank, which lent about 26 per cent of its total budget toagriculture in the 1980s but only 10 per cent in 2000 (Millstone and Lang, 2003).

Research and development (R&D) funding also moved from the public to the privatesector in most OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development)countries. In the United States, for example, from 1986 to 2009 the public share ofR&D in agriculture fell from 54 per cent to 28 per cent (Benbrook, 2011). oday,much publicly funded R&D has shifted to fundamental research, the results of which

only firms with big R&D facilities can use, rather than applied research aimed to ben-efit and be freely adopted by farmers. Even publicly funded R&D supposedly for thebenefit of small farmers has often failed because it was inappropriate to their needs andconditions (Harwood, 2009). Experience from a wide range of projects shows that,from farmer field schools to participatory plant breeding, working withsmall farmersbrings better results and yields products better suiting their needs (IAASD, 2009;Song and Vernooy, 2010; Pimbert et al., 2010).

Te relative complacency about food and farming has been shattered in the past fewyears. Factors such as major price rises in 20072008 (which increased the number ofhungry people and led to riots in some countries), the growing costs to health servicesof obesity, concern over the impact of climate change with a rising population and thelikelihood that as 2015 approaches the MDGs will remain unfulfilled, have contrib-

uted to refocusing the attention of politicians and policy-makers on food.

Future choices

Recently there has been a veritable avalanche of reports on the future of food andfarming. Many focus on how to feed a world of 9 billion people in 2050. Sometimes,though, looking into the future can distract us from dealing with the problems we

using a complex mix of policy instruments, including subsidies, extension services andfinancial incentives to farmers, led to other problems.

Te core problem for businesses dealing with food is that there is a limited demand for it(OECD, 1981). All we need is enough food for a healthy diet and that can be gainedfrom a wide range of sources, as the fantastically diverse range of food cultures shows.But in high-income countries, as affluence grew, markets quickly became saturated. Tisplaced strong pressures on businesses working in the food sector which were compet-ing for investments with businesses in other sectors where it was easier to persuade con-

sumers to buy more and more of your product. One can buy as many clothes or shoesor consumer goods as ones budget allows, without necessarily affecting ones health; butincreasing ones food consumption beyond the bodys basic needs could trigger the onsetof lifestyle diseases linked to overweight and obesity (see Box 2.6).

Tis led to high-income countries focusing on developing technological innovation toreduce costs and give innovators a competitive advantage. Businesses also concentratedon product diversification. Tey found ways of turning cheap and nutritious plantfoods into more expensive animal products such as grain-fed, intensively reared meatand dairy, of developing products with higher value added than basic foodstuffs andof finding ways to tempt people to eat more of these through marketing and advertis-ing. It also contributed to policy-makers worldwide generally neglecting agricultureand downplaying its importance. As populations became more affluent and competi-tion among businesses increased, food marketing found new themes buying new

products was associated with fun, entertainment and excitement or to obtain the loveof offspring or partners. From the very beginning, supermarkets were designed both tocut retailers costs and to increase consumption (Patel, 2007).

With increased urbanization and richer consumers in low- and middle-income coun-tries, much investment focused on serving them. Aspirations in these countries fol-lowed the patterns set in the larger economies, and were often spurred by firms seekingto expand operations beyond the confines of saturated home markets. From 1988 to1997, for example, foreign direct investment in the food industry increased fromUS$743 million to more than US$2.1 billion in Asia and from US$222 million toUS$3.3 billion in Latin America, significantly outstripping the level of investments inagriculture (FAO, 2004). At the same time, sales through supermarkets grew as muchas they had in the United States over 50 years.

Food supply chains also went global, offering out-of-season produce all year roundto those who could afford it. Poorer and smaller producers at the end of these freshfruit and vegetable supply chains which tend to be dominated by fewer and moreintegrated companies faced downward pressures on prices and small farmers becamemore marginalized (Vander Stichele et al., 2006).


16/127


C

HAPTE

R

1

28

C

HAPTE

R

1ever-increasing economic concentration of power among the providers of agro-chem-icals, machinery, seed and other inputs to farmers, among food manufacturers andretailers, and even among catering businesses around the world. Fewer and fewer firmsgained control of increased market share in all of these areas. oday, four or five graintraders control most of the grain moving around the world, a couple of companiescontrol poultry stocks and, in most high-income countries, four or five supermarketchains account for most of the food bought by consumers. Tese supermarket chainsare also expanding rapidly in low- and middle-income countries. Tis gives these largemultiple retailers a major advantage in bargaining with small suppliers, with supermar-

kets also increasingly setting the s tandards that must be met.

Tese large companies, especially those dealing with consumers, can use the power ofbrands, trademarks and advertising to influence desires and consumption patterns.Other companies, more focused on farm inputs and seeds, can increasingly use patentsand plant breeders rights to control their products, especially those that have beengenetically engineered. Rules concerning patents, trademarks, plant variety protection,copyright and trade secrets usually grouped under the term intellectual property have also become global since the mid-1990s, as have rules on agricultural trade.

Agreements on Agriculture, rade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights andSanitary and Phytosanitary Measures are all part of the set of agreements that bindmembers of the World rade Organization (WO), established in 1995. Unlike thetreaties and conventions on biodiversity, human rights or agricultural biodiversity,

WO rules are legally binding on members. Tey are supported by a binding WOdisputes settlement mechanism, which itself is backed by sanctions. So why do theymatter for hunger and malnutrition? Essentially, because they may constrain the free-dom of action of countries to set the policies that are needed to end hunger and mal-nutrition. Tey also increase the power of the large firms operating in the food sector,especially those seeking to dominate the seed markets globally (ansey, 2008; ECGroup, 2005 and 2010). Indeed, it was the powerful actors both states and corpora-tions that were most influential in shaping the rules of the world in their interests atthe end of the 20thcentury.

Tis shift in global trade rules, especially those on intellectual property better under-stood as monopoly or exclusionary privileges that are granted to some in exchange forpublic good benefits in reality entrenches the power and privileges of large corporateplayers in the food system. Such rules tend to induce t echnological innovation in areasand ways that can be controlled through patents or plant variety protection. Tat means,for example, that plant breeding becomes the main focus of response to climate changeas opposed to innovations that may require changing practices and shared knowledge,and which cannot easily be patented, privatized and turned into varieties for sale. Over-all, it makes moving to the more agro-ecological approach more difficult and will requirechanges to corporate law and accountability ( Vanloqueren and Baret, 2009).

face at present. Tese, if dealt with quickly and effectively, could reduce such futurechallenges. Te choice about the best path to the future must be made here and now.

Reports such as those from the Royal Society and the Foresight Project of the Govern-ment Office of Science in the United Kingdom recognize the very complex mix ofchallenges, including avoidance of waste and the many social and economic factorsaffecting hunger and malnutrition. Yet, fundamentally, they still implicitly assume thattechnology will deliver the key solutions (Royal Society, 2009; Foresight Project, 2011).Tey share the vision that the problems of hunger and malnutrition will be overcome

through an approach to food, farming and economic development that remains indus-trial in its thinking, technologically dominant in its approach and increasingly control-led by large corporate actors.

Other reports, such as Agrimonde (Paillard et al., 2011) from France and the Interna-tional Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and echnology for Develop-ment (IAASD, 2009), also acknowledge the complexity of the issues but argue thata fundamental change of direction is needed. Tese two reports concentrate more onan agro-ecological approach to farming; a view that builds upon existing diversity,seeks to create rural jobs and increase rural wealth, and sees a central role for the smallfarmer (see also Chapter 4). Tus, technology and economics can work in support ofan equitable and ecologically sound system.

Rethinking food security in a changing worldTis agro-ecological approach connects to the considerable evolution in thinking aboutfood security since the 1970s. At that time, the emphasis was on creating nationallymanaged stocks around the world, as well as curtailing commodity price speculationand price volatility which adversely affect the poor (see Chapter 3). By the mid-1990s,the notion of food security was framed by three keywords: access, availability andaffordability. In the last decade, there has been a growing emphasis on the need forsustainable food systems.

But even this approach has been challenged by peasants and farmers organizationsthat have combined into what is now known as the food sovereignty movement. Teircritique is that the sustainable food systems approach ignores power. For the newmovement, it is crucial that the power to control and decide the direction of change inthe food system rests with local communities and farmers (see Box 6.3).

Growth of big business and theimpact on global rules

Some of the biggest changes to the food system over the past 60 years have takenplace off the farm (ansey and Worsley, 1995). Te last half of the 20 thcentury saw an


17/127


C

HAPTE

R

1

30

C

HAPTE

R

1should be a matter of partnership, one dedicated to improving livelihoods, reducingpoverty and developing fair, resilient and ecologically sound food provisioning systemswith thriving and equal rural and urban communities with as much fair trade andexchange at all levels as possible and just rewards for all.

o achieve such an end also calls for greater civil society and humanitarian activity inmonitoring and evaluating progress and in calling states and businesses to account, tolive up to commitments already made and to become the moral if not the legal enforcers of such commitments.

Chapter 1 was written by Geoff Tansey, a writer and consultant on food system issues. Healso wrote Boxes 1.2 and 1.5. Box 1.1 was contributed by Sue Armstrong, a writer whospecializes in health and science issues. Box 1.3 was written by Lucinda OHanlon, HumanRights Officer, Special Procedures Division, OHCHR. Devinder Sharma, a leading Indian

journalist and co-founder of the India against Corruption movement, wrote Box 1.4.

Sources and further informationAbbott, C. et al. Beyond Terror: e Truth About the Real reats to Our World. New

York and London: Random House, 2007.

Benbrook, C. Innovation in evaluating Agricultural Development Projects inWorldwatch Institute,2011 State of the World: Innovations that Nourish thePlanet.New York and London: Norton and Earthscan, 2011.

Brown, L. World on the Edge: How to Prevent Environmental and Economic CollapseLondon: Earthscan, 2011. See also: www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/apr/22/water-the-next-arab-battle?INCMP=SRCH.

Concern Worldwide. Unheard Voices. Available online: www.concern.net/en/unheard-voices.

Deccan Development Society (DDS) Community Media rust, Satheesh, P.V.and Pimbert, M.Affirming Life and Diversity. Rural images and voice s on FoodSovereignty in south India. London: International Institute for Environment andDevelopment (IIED) and DDS, 2008. Available online: http://pubs.iied.org/pdfs/14556IIED.pdf.

EC Group. Global Seed Industry Concentration 2005. Ottawa: EC Group, 2005.Available online: www.etcgroup.org/en/node/48.

EC Group. Gene Giants Stockpile Patents on climate-ready crop in Bid to become Biomassters.Ottawa: EC Group, 2010. Available online:www.etcgroup.org/en/node/5221.

Food and Agricu lture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). e State of theWorlds Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture.Rome: FAO, 1998.

Te availability of patents on living organisms has helped maintain the focus on geneti-cally engineered crops and underpinned the expansion of chemical companies intoplant breeding and of takeovers in the seed business. Te result is that, at present,only a few companies control an expanding range of seed businesses around the world(Howard, 2009). Tese companies bargaining power and capacity to influence gov-ernments greatly outweigh that of small and marginalized farmers. Te rewriting ofthese global rules over the past 20 years leaves farmers rights, rights on biodiversity andthe right to food defended by relatively weak legal instruments lacking enforcementmechanisms, while those under the WO are much stronger.

Changing the functioning of the food system

Te key questions for changing the food system are determined by the amount andtypes of food that are required, food production and distribution mechanisms and themeans for apportioning the benefits that accrue from food provisioning. Currently, itis not small farmers those who actually produce most of the food in the world whoreceive the benefits. Nor is food produced in ways that develop rural infrastructure,create jobs and increase rural prosperity, so helping others to afford good food.

Tis means that there must be fundamental changes to food provisioning as currentlypractised, not just in farming (discussed further in Chapter 4) but also in the wayfood is treated beyond the farm and in how the problem of hunger and malnutritionis understood.

Te most effective way to change a whole system is to change the paradigm we use tothink about it. Questions of climate change, global justice and ecological sustainabilitydemand a radical change of tack they require us to reframe the rules and incentivesin a manner that encourages people to create a well-fed world. Big business recognizedthe need for global rules when it reshaped the international rules on intellectual prop-erty and had them formalized by the WO. But system change also means ensuringpeople have the freedom to adapt, to experiment and to act together locally which is

where the need for participation, empowerment and building from the bottom up areso important in changing the food system for th e better. We also need to make sure thatthere are safeguards in the system, such as physical stocks of grain held nationally orregionally for when unforeseen events disrupt supplies. Such problems go to the heartof our economics; prices must reflect external costs in a way that they do not at present.

Accepting the challenge, keeping upthe pressure, enforcing rights

Hunger and malnutrition will persist if we do not undertake systemic changes beyondtechnology. Tey will persist as long as those with the power to tackle poverty refuseto change or until the hungry have the power to make them do so. Ideally, change
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/apr/22/water-the-next-arab-battle?INTCMP=SRCH%22%20\o%20%22Hyperlinkhttp://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/apr/22/water-the-next-arab-battle?INTCMP=SRCH%22%20\o%20%22Hyperlinkhttp://www.concern.net/en/unheard-voices%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2010http://www.concern.net/en/unheard-voices%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2010http://pubs.iied.org/pdfs/14556IIED.pdf%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2011http://pubs.iied.org/pdfs/14556IIED.pdf%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2011http://www.etcgroup.org/en/node/48%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2012http://www.etcgroup.org/en/node/5221%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2013http://www.etcgroup.org/en/node/5221%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2013http://www.etcgroup.org/en/node/48%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2012http://pubs.iied.org/pdfs/14556IIED.pdf%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2011http://pubs.iied.org/pdfs/14556IIED.pdf%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2011http://www.concern.net/en/unheard-voices%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2010http://www.concern.net/en/unheard-voices%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2010http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/apr/22/water-the-next-arab-battle?INTCMP=SRCH%22%20\o%20%22Hyperlinkhttp://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/apr/22/water-the-next-arab-battle?INTCMP=SRCH%22%20\o%20%22Hyperlink


18/127


C

HAPTE

R

1

32

C

HAPTE

R

1west Africa involving farmers in deliberative processes on agricultural research).

Available online: www.excludedvoices.org.

MercoPress. Rural poverty remains strong in Latin America in spite of agricultureboom.8 November 2010. Available online: http://en.mercopress.com/2010/11/08/rural-poverty-remains-strong-in-latin-america-in-spite-of-agriculture-boom.

Millstone, E. and Lang, . e Atlas of Food: who eats what, where and why? London:Earthscan, 2003.

Maxwell, S. Food Security: a post-modern perspective in Food Policy, Vol. 21, No 2,

pp. 155170, 1996.

Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). Food Policy.Paris: OECD, 1981.

Oxfam.A Billion Hungry People:Governments and aid agencies must rise to the chal-lenge, Oxfam Briefing Paper 127. Oxford: Oxfam, 2009. Available online: www.oxfam.org/en/policy/bp127-billion-hungry-people.

Oxfam. Halving Hunger: Still Possible? Building a rescue package to set the MDGs backon track. Oxford: Oxfam, 2010. Available online: www.oxfam.org/sites/www.oxfam.org/files/oxfam-halving-hunger-sept-2010.pdf.

Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI). MultidimensionalPoverty Index. University of Oxford. Available online: www.ophi.org.uk/policy/multidimensional-poverty-index/.

Paillard, S. et al.Agrimonde: Scenarios and Challenges for Fe eding the World in 2050.Versailles: ditions Qu, 2011.

Panos. Pushed to the edge. 2007. Available online: http://panos.org.uk/oral-testimonies/pushed-to-the-edge/.

Panos. Living With Poverty.Oral estimony Collection. Available online: http://panos.org.uk/oral-testimonies/living-with-poverty-pakistan/.

Panos. Oral testimony collection. Available online: http://mountainvoices.org/china.asp.html .

Patel, R. Stuffed and Starved: Markets, Power and the Hidden Battle for the WorldFood System.London: Portobello, 2007.

Pimbert, M. et al. Democratising agricultural research for food sovereignty in West

Africa. Multimedia book. London: IIED, 2010. Available online: www.iied.org/pubs/display.php?o=14603IIED .

Rling, N. Conceptual and Methodological Development in Innovation inSanginga, P.C. et al., Innovation Africa: Enriching Farmers Livelihoods.London:Earthscan, 2009.

FAO. e State of Food Insecurity in the World: monitoring progress towards the WorldFood Summit and Millennium Development Goals. Rome: FAO, 2004. Availableonline: www.fao.org/docrep/007/y5650e/y5650e00.htm .

FAO. Coping with a changing climate: considerations for adaptation and mitigation inagriculture,Rome: FAO, 2009. Available online: www.fao.org/docrep/012/i1315e/i1315e00.htm.

FAO. e Second Report on the State of the Worlds Plant Genetic Resources for Foodand Agriculture. Rome: FAO, 2010a. Available online: www.fao.org/docrep/013/

i1500e/i1500e00.htm.FAO. e State of Food Insecurity in the World 2010: Addressing food insecurity in pro-

tracted crises.Rome: FAO, 2010b. Available online:www.fao.org/publications/sofi/en/.

FAO. e State of Food and Agriculture 201011: Women in Agriculture Closing thegender gap for development. Rome: FAO, 2011a. Available online: www.fao.org/publications/sofa/en/.

FAO. Global hunger declining, but still unacceptably high.Rome: FAO, 2011b.Available online: www.fao.org/hunger/en/.

Food Policy.Food security not yet. Vol. 1, No. 4, p. 270, August 1976.

Foresight Project. e Future of Food and Farming: Challenges and choices forglobal sustainability, Final Project Repo rt. London: Te Government Office forScience, 2011. Available online: www.bis.gov.uk/foresight/our-work/projects/current-projects/global-food-and-farming-futures/reports-and-publications.

Ghosh, J. Meeting the Basic Conditions of Life inAction, Spring 2011. London:World Development Movement, 2011. A related video interview available online:www.wdm.org.uk/blog/interview-professor-jayati-ghosh.

Harwood, J. Why have Green Revolutions so often failed to help peasant-farmers?Paperpresented at the Agraria n Studies Program, Yale University, New Haven, USA, 9October 2009.

Howard, P.H. Visualizing Consolidation in the Global Seed Industry: 19962008inSustainability,Vol. 1, No. 4, pp. 12661287, 2009.

International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and echnologyfor Development (IAASD).Agriculture at the Crossr oads, Synthesis repor t.

Washington DC: Island Press, 2009. Available online: www.agassessment.org.International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC). World

Disasters Report 2010: Focus on urban risk. Geneva: IFRC, 2010.

International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED). Democratisingagricultural research (work in South Asia, West Asia, Andean Altiplano and
http://www.excludedvoices.org/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2023http://en.mercopress.com/2010/11/08/rural-poverty-remains-strong-in-latin-america-in-spite-of-agriculture-boom%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2024http://en.mercopress.com/2010/11/08/rural-poverty-remains-strong-in-latin-america-in-spite-of-agriculture-boom%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2024http://www.oxfam.org/en/policy/bp127-billion-hungry-people%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2025http://www.oxfam.org/en/policy/bp127-billion-hungry-people%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2025http://www.oxfam.org/sites/www.oxfam.org/files/oxfam-halving-hunger-sept-2010.pdfhttp://www.oxfam.org/sites/www.oxfam.org/files/oxfam-halving-hunger-sept-2010.pdfhttp://www.ophi.org.uk/policy/multidimensional-poverty-index/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2026http://www.ophi.org.uk/policy/multidimensional-poverty-index/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2026http://panos.org.uk/oral-testimonies/pushed-to-the-edge/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2027http://panos.org.uk/oral-testimonies/pushed-to-the-edge/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2027http://panos.org.uk/oral-testimonies/living-with-poverty-pakistan/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2028http://panos.org.uk/oral-testimonies/living-with-poverty-pakistan/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2028http://mountainvoices.org/china.asp.html%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2029http://www.iied.org/pubs/display.php?o=14603IIED%22%20\o%20%22Hyperlink%2030http://www.iied.org/pubs/display.php?o=14603IIED%22%20\o%20%22Hyperlink%2030http://www.fao.org/docrep/007/y5650e/y5650e00.htm%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2014http://www.fao.org/docrep/012/i1315e/i1315e00.htm%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2015http://www.fao.org/docrep/012/i1315e/i1315e00.htm%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2015http://www.fao.org/docrep/013/i1500e/i1500e00.htm%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2016http://www.fao.org/docrep/013/i1500e/i1500e00.htm%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2016http://www.fao.org/publications/sofi/en/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2017http://www.fao.org/publications/sofa/en/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2018http://www.fao.org/publications/sofa/en/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2018http://www.fao.org/hunger/en/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2019http://www.bis.gov.uk/foresight/our-work/projects/current-projects/global-food-and-farming-futures/reports-and-publications%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2020http://www.bis.gov.uk/foresight/our-work/projects/current-projects/global-food-and-farming-futures/reports-and-publications%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2020http://www.wdm.org.uk/blog/interview-professor-jayati-ghosh%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2021http://www.agassessment.org/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2022http://www.agassessment.org/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2022http://www.wdm.org.uk/blog/interview-professor-jayati-ghosh%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2021http://www.bis.gov.uk/foresight/our-work/projects/current-projects/global-food-and-farming-futures/reports-and-publications%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2020http://www.bis.gov.uk/foresight/our-work/projects/current-projects/global-food-and-farming-futures/reports-and-publications%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2020http://www.fao.org/hunger/en/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2019http://www.fao.org/publications/sofa/en/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2018http://www.fao.org/publications/sofa/en/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2018http://www.fao.org/publications/sofi/en/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2017http://www.fao.org/docrep/013/i1500e/i1500e00.htm%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2016http://www.fao.org/docrep/013/i1500e/i1500e00.htm%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2016http://www.fao.org/docrep/012/i1315e/i1315e00.htm%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2015http://www.fao.org/docrep/012/i1315e/i1315e00.htm%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2015http://www.fao.org/docrep/007/y5650e/y5650e00.htm%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2014http://www.iied.org/pubs/display.php?o=14603IIED%22%20\o%20%22Hyperlink%2030http://www.iied.org/pubs/display.php?o=14603IIED%22%20\o%20%22Hyperlink%2030http://mountainvoices.org/china.asp.html%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2029http://panos.org.uk/oral-testimonies/living-with-poverty-pakistan/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2028http://panos.org.uk/oral-testimonies/living-with-poverty-pakistan/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2028http://panos.org.uk/oral-testimonies/pushed-to-the-edge/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2027http://panos.org.uk/oral-testimonies/pushed-to-the-edge/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2027http://www.ophi.org.uk/policy/multidimensional-poverty-index/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2026http://www.ophi.org.uk/policy/multidimensional-poverty-index/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2026http://www.oxfam.org/sites/www.oxfam.org/files/oxfam-halving-hunger-sept-2010.pdfhttp://www.oxfam.org/sites/www.oxfam.org/files/oxfam-halving-hunger-sept-2010.pdfhttp://www.oxfam.org/en/policy/bp127-billion-hungry-people%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2025http://www.oxfam.org/en/policy/bp127-billion-hungry-people%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2025http://en.mercopress.com/2010/11/08/rural-poverty-remains-strong-in-latin-america-in-spite-of-agriculture-boom%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2024http://en.mercopress.com/2010/11/08/rural-poverty-remains-strong-in-latin-america-in-spite-of-agriculture-boom%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2024http://www.excludedvoices.org/%22%20/o%20%22Hyperlink%2023


19/127


C

HAPTE

R

1

34

C

HAPTE

R

1United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Activities of

the Special Rapporteur. Available online: www2.ohchr.org/english/issues/water/iexpert/index.htm.

United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). Supplemental NutritionAssistance Program Participation and Cost. 2010. Available online: www.fns.usda.gov/pd/SNAPsummary.htm. Accessed 16 March 2011. See also videoreport: www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=1274 .

United States State Department. Global Hunger and Food Security.Washington DC:

US State Department, 2009. Available online: www.state.gov/documents/organi-zation/129768.pdf.

Vander Stichele, M. et al. Who reaps the Fruit? Critical Issues in the Fresh Fruitand Vegetable Chain. Update. Amsterdam: SOMO (Centre for Researchon Multinational Corporations), 2006. Available online: http://somo.nl/publications-en/Publication_633/?searchterm=.

Vanloqueren, G. and Baret, P.V. How agricultura l research sy stems shape a tech-nological regime that develops genetic engineering but locks out agroecologicalinnovations in Research Policy,Vol. 38, No. 6, pp. 971983, 2009.

Wiesmann, D.2006 Global hunger index. Washington DC: InternationalFood Policy Research Institute, 2006. Available online: www.ifpri.org/publication/2006-global-hunger-index.

World Health Organization (W HO). WHO Fact Sheet no. 311. Obesity and over-weight.Updated March 2011. Available online: www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs311/en/index.html.

Royal Society. Reaping the benefits: science and the sustainable intensification of globalagriculture. London: Royal Societ y, 2009.

Sen, A. Poverty and Famines: An Essay on Entitlement and Deprivation. Oxford:Oxford University Press, 1981.

Shaw, D.J. World Food Security: A History since 1945. Basingstoke: PalgraveMacmillan, 2007.

Song, Y. and Vernooy, R. Seeds and Synergies: Innovating Rural Development inChina. London and Ottawa: Practical Action and International Development

Research Centre, 2010.

Sustainable Development Commission. Food security and sustainability; e perfectfit. SDC position paper. London: SDC, 2009.

Sutcliffe, B. World Inequality and Globalization in Oxford Review of EconomicPolicy, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp. 1537, 2004.

ansey, G. Whose Power to Control? Some Reflections on Seed Systems and FoodSecurity in a Changing World in IDS Bulletin, forthcoming, 2011.

ansey, G. Farming, Food and Global Ru les in ansey G. and Rajotte, ., op.cit.

ansey G. and Rajotte, . e Future Control of Food: A Guide to InternationalNegotiations and Rules on Intellectual Property, Biodiversity and Food Security.London: Earthscan, 2008. Available online: www.idrc.ca/openebooks/397-3/.

ansey, G. and Worsley, . e Food System: a Guide. London: Earthscan, 1995.

Te Sphere Project. SphereHumanitarian Charter and Minimum Standards in DisasterResponse. Tird Edition. Geneva: Sphere Project, 2011. Available online: www.sphereproject.org/component/option,com_docman/task,cat_view/gid,70/Itemid,203 .

rench, P. et al. Beyond Any Drought: Root causes of chronic vulnerability in the Sahel.London: Te Sahel Working Group and IIED, 2007. Available online: http://pubs.iied.org/G02317.html?k=Beyond%20Any%20Drought . Accessed 16 March 2011.

United Kingdom Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra).Ensuring the UKs food security in a changing world. London: Defra, 2008.

Available online: www.defra.gov.uk/foodrin/pdf/Ensuring-UK-Food-Security-in-a-changi

World Disaster Report 2011 FINAL

Documents

Transcript of World Disaster Report 2011 FINAL