Addressing the "in" in food insecurity

Addressing the "in" in food insecurity

Published Jan 2003

Authors

P. Webb, B. Rogers

Publisher

Focus themes

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Implications of poverty and malnutrition for USAID food security programming

This policy brief argues for a conceptual shift that explicitly acknowledges the risks that constrain progress towards enhanced food security, and addresses directly the vulnerability of food insecure households and communities by:

  • enhancing peoples’ resiliency to overcome shocks, building people’s capacity to transcend food insecurity with a more durable and diverse livelihood base
  • increasing human capital which will result in long-term sustainable improvements in food security

A number of preliminary conclusions are proposed:

  • USAID should continue to focus attention and investments in the most food insecure countries
  • food insecurity analyses at the local level will facilitate the identification of the most appropriate combinations of interventions
  • greater attention is needed to the issues raised by rapid urbanisation and to the degree to which AIDS morbidity, possibly more than mortality, becomes a primary cause of food insecurity
  • there should be an increased focus on capacity-strengthening with Title II partners and local institutions
  • the secular decline in food aid availability and its annual volatility should be addressed through financing mechanisms that allow for programming food in more predictable quantities over a relatively longer time horizon

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