Agriculture and Food Security

A key element of “freedom from fear” and “freedom from want” is a sense that food will be available when needed. Food security includes Food Stability (is it available over time?), Food Access (is it affordable and allocated well?), and Food Availability (Is there a supply?) Many in the developed world take food security for granted, even as fellow citizens, and much of the developing world, live in states of “precarity” without being sure of the availability of food or other resources.

In fact, the global food supply system is complex, interdependent, and at risk. It can be affected by the global water crisis, climate change, land degradation, and unfair land deals. Disruptions in one place can lead not only to local or regional unrest (such as increases in food prices in the Middle East did before the “Arab Spring”) but also to impacts thousands of miles away.

Goal 2 of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is to “End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture.” STAR-TIDES supports this goal, along with the other SDGs. An excellent report on one aspect is Fred T. Davies’ & Banning Garrett’s report for the Global Federation of Competitiveness Councils (GFCC), Connecting Farm, City, and Technology: Transforming Urban Food Ecosystems in the Developing World, 2019.