South Perspectives - February 1997

Foreword

Perhaps for the first time in human history, universal food security has become a realistic technical possibility if not a political one. At the global level enough food is already being produced so that theoretically all people could have access to adequate diets at all times. Food production could be increased sustainably at reasonable cost in both food deficit and surplus countries to meet increased needs in the foreseeable future. Modern transport, communications, processing, storage and organization make feasible rapid transfers of food from and to practically any place on the globe in order to cope with emergencies. Nonetheless, over one fifth of humanity, mostly in developing countries, currently suffers from hunger due to inadequate access to sufficient food.

The issues raised in this paper reflect major ongoing concerns about food security in developing countries. Several of these issues were addressed in the “Rome Declaration on World Food Security and World Food Summit Plan of Action”. However, they were dealt with in a somewhat superficial manner. Moreover, Northern interests and the liberalization agenda embedded in the “Washington consensus” heavily influenced this Summit document. More serious for the interests of the South may be that no politically realistic strategy emerged for mobilizing popularly based movements and governments to eliminate hunger.

The purpose of this publication is to emphasize in an integrated manner a set of food security issues and policies of particular concern to peoples and governments of developing countries. The South Centre hopes it will contribute to more effective actions towards universal food security. An earlier version of this paper was prepared as a contribution to discussions at the World Food Summit held at FAO Headquarters, 13-17 November 1996.

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