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Framework of food production, distribution and consumption
Context in source publication
Context 1
... Food security has been defined in multiple ways that can best be summarized in three dominant paradigms. The first paradigm understands food insecurity and famine as a direct consequence of food shortages caused by climatic variables (environmental view) or demographic pressures (neo- Malthusian or demographic theory). Climatic variables attracted widespread attention during the droughts of the 1970s in the Horn of Africa, which caused large-scale famines. These famines were explained as the consequence of a lack of capacity of social systems to deal with external (climatic) shocks. The dominant policy response was massive food aid. Neo-Malthusian theory comes to a similar policy recommendation in its call for increased agricultural production. According to this theory, food insecurity and famine are caused by food availability decline due to rising demand (demographic pressure) and stagnating production. Even if this view has lost much of its attraction, it is still pursued by leading think tanks such as the Worldwatch Institute, which has warned of a “new era of food scarcity” (Devereux, 2000). 7. In the early 1980s, the theses of declining carrying capacities and supply failures were rejected by Amartya Sen, whose “entitlement theory” of famine made a distinction between the availability of food and people’s ability to acquire it. This ability is reflected by people’s “exchange entitlements” or livelihood sources, which include production-based entitlements, own-labour entitlements, trade- based entitlements and inheritance and transfer entitlements. In this view, famines and other food- related emergencies are economic disasters caused by failures of demand, or by a sharp decline in people’s entitlements. which leads to inability to command enough food for subsistence even when markets are well stocked. In order to prevent famine, therefore, interventions should strengthen people’s access to food either by the production of food or by the exchange of other commodities or services for food (Sen, 1981). This economic view of food security, which is also repeated in the World Bank’s definition of food security (“access by all people at all times to sufficient food for an active, healthy life” (World Bank, 1986)), disregards the notion of sustainability, or sufficient access to food over the long term, and the notion of vulnerability, or the risk of exposure to shocks and the ability to cope with these shocks and recover from risks to livelihoods (Maxwell and Wiebe, 1999). 8. Sen’s stress on the relationship between people and markets as the root of famine also neglects the political context or the larger “structures of inequality” (Seddon and Adhikari, 2003) that explain why some people have easier access to food than others. It also fails to explain why famine may create opportunities and benefits for some while reducing them for others. Since the 1990s, an increasing number of authors view famine as a political phenomenon that is not caused by lack of food production or market deregulations, but by political powerlessness. Keen has stressed that “a lack of lobbying power within national (and international) institutions” is the main reason for food insecurity (Keen, 1994). It is the wider political and institutional context that explains why those hit hardest by famine are those that are the most politically vulnerable. De Waal goes even further and claims that “famine is caused by failures of political accountability” (de Waal, 1997). Rather than strengthening the availability of food and people’s access to food, the political famine theory urges that interventions focus on state reconstruction, good governance and accountability. 9. The advantage of the last paradigm is that it offers a valuable framework to relate people’s livelihood strategies to structures, institutions and organizations, or to the wider political economy. If food security in its most extreme appearance is “a socio-economic process which causes the accelerated destitution of the most vulnerable, marginal and least powerful groups in the community, to a point where they can no longer, as a group, maintain a sustainable livelihood” (Walker, 1989), it is also the outcome of political structures and processes. A better understanding of the complex and open-ended phenomenon of food insecurity (Devereux, 2000) thus includes a comprehension of the key mechanisms that cause unequal food availability and unequal entitlements to food, as well as of people’s coping strategies and the range of constraints and opportunities affecting the livelihood strategies of households and individuals. Figure 1, developed by Seddon and Adhiraki, presents a framework that integrates these issues. The central element of the model is the link between political economy and people’s claims and entitlements to assets needed for an effective pursuit of sustainable and secure livelihood strategies and to attain food security (Seddon and Adhiraki, ...
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Citations
... The HFIAS captures access to food. Gebreyesus et al. [34] assumed that "the experience of food insecurity (access) causes predictable reactions and responses that can be quantified and summarized in a scale." Therefore, HFIAS is an account outcome variable. ...
... According to Alinovi et al. [66], the number of undernourished people in DRC has tripled from 12 to 36 million, and the prevalence increased from 31 to 72% of the population. In 2002, about 80% of the Congolese population lived below the poverty line of around US$0.2 per day [67]. Climate change also causes major events in DRC, for example, between 1974 and 2003, 19 natural disasters were recorder in DRC. ...
... However, this study has shown that several of these interventions have not led to food security in the region as most of the households continue to whirl in food deficits. Previous studies in the region and elsewhere in the semiarid areas have linked food insecurity in these areas to drought Vlassenroot et al. [34] and Turyahabwe et al. [35] events. ...
Background
Drought is regarded as a leading cause of food insecurity affecting about 220 million people in sub-Saharan Africa. Drought early warning systems (DEWSs) have the potential to strengthen capacity of communities in managing and reducing drought effects through building preparedness and providing coping strategies. The Karamoja subregion is the only region with a functional DEWS in Uganda. The subregion suffers from effects of recurrent episodes of drought with negative impacts on food security. Despite having DEWS in place, the subregion remains the most food insecure in the country. The extent to which DEWS has contributed to household food security in the subregion remains unclear. This study determined the effect of DEWS on agro-pastoral household food security in the subregion. The study was conducted in Nakapiripirit and Kotido districts of the Karamoja. A cross-sectional survey was conducted among 305 participating and non-participating households in DEWS. The effect of participating in DEWS on food security was analyzed using the generalized linear model. The level of food security and nutrition were measured using the household food insecurity access score and household dietary diversity score (HDDS), respectively.
Results
Findings showed that all respondents had experienced food insecurity during the course of the year. Drought was indicated as the main cause of food insecurity in the households. Participation in DEWS significantly (p < 0.01) reduced the threat of food insecurity by 23.7% and increased the level of household nutrition by 30%. Better nutrition was realized in DEWS participating households (HDDS = 9.0) compared to non-participating households (HDDS = 6.6).
Conclusion
Owing to intermittent drought events in the Karamoja subregion, DEWS contributes to household food security and nutrition by providing households with information on timely planting, crop diversification, farm equipment, drought management and drought-tolerant crop varieties. There is need for DEWS practitioners to focus on information dissemination, provision of drought-tolerant crops and provision of training opportunities to communities for increased production in semi-arid areas.
... These changes seriously affect rural households of whom many engage in agriculture which implies that they are both producers and consumers. In several regions, the main problem is not the food availability but rather the lack of market opportunities, caused by the insecurity, the lack of roads, shifts in the food prices, the lack of cash, etc. Against this reality, there stands the fact that most food security interventions still tend to focus on the food availability rather than the access to food and markets (Vlassenroot 2003). ...
... The ECHO has focused exclusively on the emergency needs and is progressively withdrawing from more stable areas. The ECHO support is mainly provided through the NGOs and is concentrated in the "red zones", which are defined as unstable regions still suffering from the conflict or emerging from a recent conflict, and in the "blue areas", or regions where the intense fighting took place between 1998 and 2001, and which since then have gained a certain degree of the minimal contextual (Vlassenroot et al. 2003). ...
The article is focused on food problem in the least developed countries, on the chosen areas where the overall situation is the most problematic. It deals with the Democratic Republic of the Congo, belonging to the low income food deficit countries with one of the world’s lowest rates of the gross domestic product per capita. The paper defines the food security situation in a global connection, representing a wide complex of economic, social, demographic, technologic and political aspects of production, distribution, shift and consumption of foodstuffs. Despite some progresses in the political situation, the effects of the economic crisis and the widespread food insecurity are expected to persist. Tehumanitarian assistance is now needed to support the needs of the most vulnerable. In the longer term, the countries have the significant goal of consolidating peace and security and strengthening the overall governance, while at the same time reconstructing and rehabilitating their economy.
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... Perhaps this could be the reason why local people use wetlands as safety nets during the drought since wetlands are able to store more water and moisture during the dry periods. Taking a single meal a day seems to be a commonly agreed indicator of food insecurity, but also adapted as a coping strategy across sub-Saharan Africa [39]. Prevalence of food insecurity is significantly lower among households with older and better educated household heads because ability to access assets needed to secure livelihoods increase with seniority and, as noted by Muchapodwa [40], education makes it easier for households to comprehend negative externalities and be able to generate cash for buying food. ...
In Uganda, nearly 1.4 million people are currently food insecure, with the prevalence of food
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rain-fed agriculture. Accordingly, the farmer’s means of increasing food production has
always been an expansion of area under cultivation from virgin and fragile areas, especially
wetlands. Consequently, Uganda has lost about 11,268 km2 of wetland, representing a loss of
30% of the country’s wetlands from 1994 to 2009. While the environmental importance of
wetland ecosystems is widely recognized, their contribution to household food security is still
hardly explored. In this paper an assessment of the contribution of wetland resources to
household food security and factors influencing use of wetland resources in Uganda are
reported.In Uganda, nearly 1.4 million people are currently food insecure, with the prevalence of food
energy deficiency at the country level standing at 37%. Local farmers are vulnerable to
starvation in times of environmental stress, drought and floods because of dependence on
rain-fed agriculture. Accordingly, the farmer’s means of increasing food production has
always been an expansion of area under cultivation from virgin and fragile areas, especially
wetlands. Consequently, Uganda has lost about 11,268 km2 of wetland, representing a loss of
30% of the country’s wetlands from 1994 to 2009. While the environmental importance of
wetland ecosystems is widely recognized, their contribution to household food security is still
hardly explored. In this paper an assessment of the contribution of wetland resources to
household food security and factors influencing use of wetland resources in Uganda are
reported.
... FAO studies confirm that rural women make a tremendous contribution to food and agricultural production. They also play a crucial role in determining and guaranteeing food security and well-being for the entire household [13] , it was therefore necessary that questions requiring details on household consumption patterns were addressed to women (caregivers); women respondents were purposefully selected for the household interviews. ...
... FAO studies confirm that rural women make a tremendous contribution to food and agricultural production. They also play a crucial role in determining and guaranteeing food security and well-being for the entire household [13]. It was, therefore, necessary that questions requiring details on household consumption patterns were addressed to women (caregivers). ...
... The girls may be forced to drop out of school due to a lack of money for tuition fees. The low income level observed in this study is also supported by a report which indicated that more than 80% of Congolese live on less than $1 per day [13]. ...
This cross-sectional study carried out in North Kivu (NK) and South Kivu (SK) of the Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo aimed to identify the most preferred Musa cultivars, their processing/cooking methods and Musa consumption patterns among rural households. Our results showed that the preferred cooking banana varieties included yellow-pulped AAA-East African Highland bananas [EAHB] 'Nshikazi' (SK) and 'Vulambya' (NK), which were valued for their cooking qualities, large bunches and suitability for production of banana beer. The preferred plantains were orange-pulped and included 'Musheba' (SK) and 'Musilongo' (NK) and were preferred for their short maturation period, large bunches and higher market prices. Over 60% of the households examined had consumed EAHB within 24 hours, whereas <10% had consumed plantains. The most common cooking method was simple boiling of bananas/plantains and main accompaniments include beans and amaranth leaves. Over 69% of surveyed households that had consumed Musa products had consumed them boiled. The majority of the households (90%) obtained banana/plantains from their farms, and >55% of households from SK and NK consumed banana products between 2 and 4 times/week. This information will be used to help direct researchers on the Musa cultivars that could be further sampled for carotenoid analysis and those found to be rich could be used in the fast-tracking approach to reduce Vitamin A deficiency.
... Reasons for the severe Congolese food crisis are on the one hand related to the complex land tenure system, which promotes large scale land ownership, and on the other hand to the lack of access to basic agricultural infrastructure, including access to land and to agrochemicals. All these factors favored yield reductions and repeatedly led to crop failures due to pests(Vlassenroot et al. 2007). The two recent conflicts (the First and Second Congo Wars) that commenced in 1996 left the country war torn and in economic recession.HANPP on the African continent and for the total of the ten countries discussed in this section increased by about 54% from around 13% in 1980 to around 20% of NPP 0 in 2005.However, land use efficiency for the entire continent was rather low and did not improve over time. ...
Human land use has major impacts on natural ecosystems. The human appropriation of net
primary production (HANPP) is a prominent socio-ecological indicator of land use
intensity. HANPP measures two different processes: (1) changes in productivity of natural
ecosystems induced by humans, and (2) the amount of biomass harvested or destroyed
during harvest. HANPP influences ecosystem processes and services. It affects the amount
of energy available for natural food webs, and hence biodiversity. Also it is related to
climate through its impact on the carbon balance of ecosystems and it is related to processes
such as soil degradation. Although HANPP levels in Africa are rather low compared to
other world regions such as Europe and Asia, it grew considerably over the last decades.
Total African HANPP increased by 53% from 1980 to 2005 exhibiting large regional
variations: HANPP increased by about 84% in West Africa, 55% in East Africa, 50% in
North Africa, 27% in Central Africa and only 10% in South Africa. In absolute figures,
HANPP is rather low in many countries. However, it is likely that these results are an
underestimation, as most national statistics do not account for large fractions of subsistence
production which is one of the most important sources for many rural livelihoods. HANPP
efficiency in most African countries was low throughout the entire time period investigated,
indicating high losses of productivity (ΔNPPLC) compared to relatively low levels of
harvested biomass (the HANPP fractions which can be directly used by humans). This is in
particular highlighted when compared to other world regions where almost the entire
fraction of HANPP consists of societal harvest. Reasons for this are complex and often
manifested in economic and political constraints limiting high performing agriculture and
causing low agricultural yields, especially on a local scale. Our results suggest that
agricultural land is expanding in much of Africa, accompanied by inefficient land use
systems in Central African and some Western African countries. Trade-related HANPP
(HANPP plus imports minus exports) shows a distinctive pattern over the entire continent.
Large net-import countries are the North African desert states, whereas Sub-Saharan
countries are mostly HANPP net-exporters, though at a modest rate. However, Africa’s
share of globally traded HANPP is rather low, covering only 11.42% of global HANPP
imports and just 4.2% of global HANPP exports. In the light of population surges and
increasing demand for biomass imports dependency is likely to increase in future,
exacerbating food insecurity in the coming decades. Additionally the current trends of
human induced soil degradation on African drylands pose a further challenge on its
agricultural production systems. Yet 10% of Africa’s dryland areas are prone to
degradation, causing productivity losses between 18% and 50% of the potential
productivity on affected areas. In order to address this predicament, integrated policy
measures that enhance farmers’ access to knowledge and agricultural assets are crucial.
... In humanitarian assistance, a great deal of livelihood interventions are to do with improving food security, through aiming at specific sectors, such as production, income, and market (Jaspars et al. 2007, p.39). 28 However, various authors describe a tendency to focus too much on the availability of food, instead of on the underlying causes, which have to do with access and stability (Levine & Chastre 2004;Vlassenroot et al. 2006;Alinovi et al. 2007;Lecoutere et al. 2009). In their report 'Missing the Point', Livine and Chastre (2004), in part based on evidence from DRC, criticised interventions for not being based on necessary assessments (even though much information was available), but instead on the available small set of actions that were implemented in almost every situation. ...
... The plantations remain conspicuous scars on the geography of the region today, all but inoperative since 1998, providing little wage labour in return for their occupation of valuable land (Vlassenroot, 2007). As a measure of stability returns, however, the resumption of agro-industrial activities seems likely, as in the quinquina fields of Burhale whose owner PHARMAKINA, a Belgo-German initiative of 1956, is gearing up again in French and German hands. ...
... The changes wrought by land policies before the wars placed many farmers in states of extreme vulnerability, exploited by employers, tied to distant markets, and clinging to shrinking plots of secondrate land as they struggled to live up to the ideal of 'fending for themselves'. The restructuring of land not only left households susceptible to the fallout of war, but also deepened the multifarious resentments that gave the conflict much of its ferocity, swelled militias with the landless, and in many areas (Vlassenroot, Ntububa and Raeymaekers, 2007) made control and destruction of the productive base key tactics of the war itself. ...
Prior to 1996 and the Congolese wars, exploitative land policies pushed farmers in the eastern highlands of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) into a vulnerable position, with cattle manure sustaining intensive cultivation. This exposed households to a complete breakdown in mixed farming as cattle became targets of war. This study of villages in South Kivu offers an inside understanding of continuity and change in farming practices in a region where there are no easy solutions, and it assesses how the province lost its present and where farmers look when they glance to the future. For farmers, who hold a broad view of soil fertility, the casualties of war were not only people and cattle but also the land itself, which has enduring scars. Perceiving a rupture in tradition, South Kivu farmers are searching desperately for new livelihoods that are built on education instead of livestock, setting aside old ethnic signifiers to seek a future beyond protracted conflict.
