Food politics

Question

This piglix contains articles or sub-piglix about Food politics

Answer 1

The Food Wars

The Food Wars is a 2009 book by Walden Bello which examines the food crisis and issues relating to food security.

It was originally published on 25 September 2009.

Philip McMichael described that book as "A comprehensive and timely corrective to agribusiness-as-usual scenarios for solving the food crisis ... His solutions are compelling and critical for planetary sustainability."
Naomi Klein praised the book.

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Answer 2

Global Hunger Index

The Global Hunger Index (GHI) is a multidimensional statistical tool used to describe the state of countries’ hunger situation. The GHI measures progress and failures in the global fight against hunger. The GHI is updated once a year.

The Index was adopted and further developed by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), and was first published in 2006 with the Welthungerhilfe, a German non-profit organization (NPO). Since 2007, the Irish NGO Concern Worldwide joined the group as co-publisher.

The 2016 Global Hunger Index (GHI) report—the eleventh in an annual series—presents a multidimensional measure of national, regional, and global hunger. It shows that the world has made progress in reducing hunger since 2000, but still has a long way to go, with levels of hunger still serious or alarming in 50 countries. This year's report hails a new paradigm of international development proposed in the United Nations’ 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which envisages Zero Hunger by 2030, as one goal among 17, in a holistic, integrated, and transformative plan for the world.

In addition to the ranking, the Global Hunger Index report every year focuses on a main topic: in 2016 the thematic focus is on getting to zero hunger.

Topics of previous years included:

In addition to the yearly GHI, the Hunger Index for the States of India (ISHI) was published in 2008 and the Sub-National Hunger Index for Ethiopia was published in 2009.

India tops world hunger list with 194 million people. That's more than the combined population of Australia, Canada, United Kingdom and France.

An interactive map allows users to visualize the data for different years and zoom into specific regions or countries.

The Index ranks countries on a 100-point scale, with 0 being the best score (no hunger) and 100 being the worst, although neither of these extremes is reached in practice. Values less than 10.0 reflect low hunger, values from 10.0 to 19.9 reflect moderate hunger, values from 20.0 to 34.9 indicate serious hunger, values from 35.0 to 49.9 reflect alarming hunger, and values of 50.0 or more reflect extremely alarming hunger levels.

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Answer 3

Freedom fries

Freedom fries was a political euphemism for French fries in the United States. The term came to prominence in 2003 when the then Republican Chairman of the Committee on House Administration, Bob Ney, renamed the menu item in three Congressional cafeterias in response to France's opposition to the proposed invasion of Iraq. Although originally supported with several restaurants changing their menus as well, the term fell out of use due to declining support for the Iraq War. Following Ney's resignation as Chairman in 2006, it was quietly reverted.

Following the September 11 attacks by Al-Qaeda and the declaration of a "War on Terror" by President George W. Bush, an invasion of Iraq was proposed. During the United Nations Security Council deliberations, French Minister of Foreign Affairs Dominique de Villepin made it clear France would neither support nor participate in the invasion. This caused some Americans to accuse France of betrayal, reigniting prior anti-French sentiment in the United States.

Renaming was initiated in February 2003 by Beaufort, North Carolina "Cubbie's" restaurant owner Neal Rowland, who said he was motivated by similar actions against Germany in World War I, when "sauerkraut was called liberty cabbage, and frankfurters were renamed hot dogs". In an interview about the name change, Rowland commented "since the French are backing down [from the war], French fries and French everything needs to be banned". In March 2007, Rowland obtained a trademark registration for the term "freedom fries".

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Answer 4

Foodshed

A foodshed is the geographic region that produces the food for a particular population. The term is used to describe a region of food flows, from the area where it is produced, to the place where it is consumed, including: the land it grows on, the route it travels, the markets it passes through, and the tables it ends up on. "Foodshed" is described as a "socio-geographic space: human activity embedded in the natural integument of a particular place." A foodshed is analogous to a watershed in that foodsheds outline the flow of food feeding a particular population, whereas watersheds outline the flow of water draining to a particular location. Through drawing from the conceptual ideas of the watershed, foodsheds are perceived as hybrid social and natural constructs.

It can pertain to the area from which an individual or population receives a particular type of food, or the collective area from which an individual or population receives all of their food. The size of the foodshed can vary depending on the availability of year round foods and the variety of foods grown and processed. Variables such as micro-weather patterns, soil types, water availability, slope conditions, etc. play a role in determining the potential and risk of agriculture).

The modern United States foodshed, as an example, spans the entire world as the foods available in the typical supermarket have traveled from all over the globe, often long distances from where they were produced.

The term was coined in 1929 in the book How Great Cities Are Fed by W.P. Hedden, who was at the time Chief of the Bureau of Commerce for the Port of New York Authority. Hedden described a ‘foodshed’ in 1929 as the ‘dikes and dams’ guiding the flow of food from the producer to consumer. Hedden contrasts foodsheds with watersheds by noting that “the barriers which deflect raindrops into one river basin rather than into another are natural land elevations, while the barriers which guide and control movements of foodstuffs are more often economic than physical.” Hedden describes the economic forces that influence where foods are produced and how they are transported to the cities in which they are consumed. The term has more recently been reintroduced by permaculturist Arthur Getz, in his 1991 article “Urban Foodsheds” in “Permaculture Activist", to provide an image that helps people to understand how food systems work and that suggests food comes from a source that must be protected.

Eating within a local foodshed was once the only way in which families gained access to food. In the seventeenth or eighteenth century, most ingredients were drawn from an area of less than fifty acres. There was an interdependence of farming and what was cooked in the kitchen. Farmers gained a sensibility about the land—improved and well-tended land could yield a cornucopian spread and was regarded as a source of food and a sign of wealth. Envisioning and knowing a landscape as one's fount of food is different from what most of us know and experience when driving past fields in the countryside today. People ate food that was in season, when available, or that was preserved. Very few items came from afar, and if they did they came in small amounts, such as cinnamon and nutmeg. Growing, cooking, and eating food connected most people in preindustrial America to the land.

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Answer 5

GO TEXAN

Go Texan day sponsored by the Texas Department of Agriculture, whose purpose is to encourage consumers (both within and outside the state of Texas) to seek and purchase Texas-made products.

The GO TEXAN campaign began in 1999 to focus on Texas agricultural products. Later, the campaign expanded to include shrimp and Texas wine. In 2003, the Texas Legislature expanded the program to include Texas-made products of all sorts.

The current GO TEXAN campaign is divided into four general areas:

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Answer 6

Cura Annonae

In ancient Rome, the Romans used the term Cura Annonae ("care for the grain supply"), in honour of their goddess Annona and the grain dole was distributed from the Temple of Ceres. The Aedile took care of the grain supply (Cura Annonae) as part of his duties.

In classical antiquity, the grain supply to the city of Rome could not be met entirely from the surrounding countryside, which was taken up by the villas and parks of the aristocracy and which produced mainly fruit, vegetables and other perishable goods. The city therefore became increasingly reliant on grain supplies from other parts of Italy, notably Campania, and from elsewhere in the empire, particularly the provinces of Sicily, North Africa and Egypt. These regions were capable of shipping adequate grain for the population of the capital amounting to 60 million modii (540 million litres / 540,000 cubic metres or 135 million gallons / 16.8 million bushels) annually, according to some sources. These provinces and the shipping lanes that connected them with Ostia and other important ports thus gained great strategic importance. Whoever controlled the grain supply had an important measure of control over the city of Rome.

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Answer 7

India State Hunger Index

The India State Hunger Index (ISHI) is a tool to calculate hunger and malnutrition at the regional level in India. It is constructed in the same fashion as the Global Hunger Index (GHI) 2008 and was calculated for 17 states in India, covering more than 95 percent of the population.

The ISHI was developed by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and presented for the first time 2008 in conjunction with the Non-Governmental Organization Welthungerhilfe and the Department of Economics, University of California.

Despite the good economic performance, with over 200 million people who are food insecure, India is home to the largest number of hungry people in the world. In the ranking of the Global Hunger Index 2008 it covers position 66 out of 88 ranked countries and has an “alarming“ (23.7) food security situation. The major problem in the country is the high prevalence of underweight children under five, which is a result of low nutrition and educational status of women.

While there has been attention to hunger and undernourishment at the central level, within India's political system, states are important political units with regard to the planning and execution of development programs. Thus unpacking the hunger index at the level of the federal states is an important tool to build awareness of the disparities in hunger among them. In addition, the variability of the relative contribution of the underlying components of the hunger index across the different Indian states can help to stimulate the discussion about the drivers of hunger in different state contexts.

The ISHI is constructed in the same fashion as the Global Hunger Index which follows a multidimensional approach to measuring hunger and malnutrition. It combines three equally weighted indicators:

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Answer 8

International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development

The International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD) was a three-year international collaborative effort (2005–2007) initiated by the World Bank in 2002, which evaluated the relevance, quality and effectiveness of agricultural knowledge, science, and technology, and the effectiveness of public and private sector policies and institutional arrangements.

The project involved 900 participants and 110 countries with co-sponsorship of the FAO, Global Environment Facility, UNDP, UNEP, UNESCO, the World Bank and WHO. It assessed agricultural knowledge, science, and technology with respect to development and sustainability goals of reducing hunger and poverty, improving nutrition, health, rural livelihoods, and facilitating social and environmental sustainability.

The results of the project were reviewed and ratified during the intergovernmental plenary meeting held 7–12 April 2008, in Johannesburg, South Africa.

The geographically based multi-stakeholder Bureau was composed of 30 government representatives from different regions, 22 representatives from non-governmental organizations, consumer groups and producer groups, representatives from 8 institutions, and 2 co-chairs. The sponsoring agencies served as ex officio members of the Bureau.

The IAASTD had a distributed secretariat for management and oversight in Washington DC and others in FAO (Rome), UNEP (Nairobi), and UNESCO (Paris). The Director was Robert T. Watson.

The IAASTD was composed of one Global Assessment and five Sub-global Assessments, which used the same framework: the impacts of agricultural knowledge, science, and technology on hunger, poverty, nutrition, human health, and environmental and social sustainability in the past and the future. The Global and Sub-global assessments were peer-reviewed by governments and experts, and approved by the panel of participating governments.

The five Sub-global Assessments complemented the Global Assessment by examining geographic area-specific aspects:
- Central and West Asia and North Africa (CWANA) - Regional Institute: ICARDA (International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas)
- East and South Asia and the Pacific (ESAP) - Regional Institute: World Fish Center
- Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) - Regional Institute: IICA (Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture)
- North America and Europe (NAE)
- Sub-Saharan Africa - Regional Institute: ACTS (African Centre for Technology Studies)

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Answer 9

International Food Policy Research Institute

International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI)

The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) is an international agricultural research center founded in the early 1970s to improve the understanding of national agricultural and food policies to promote the adoption of innovations in agricultural technology. Additionally, IFPRI was meant to shed more light on the role of agricultural and rural development in the broader development pathway of a country. The mission of IFPRI is to seek sustainable solutions for ending hunger and poverty through research.

IFPRI carries out food policy research and disseminates it through hundreds of publications, bulletins, conferences, and other initiatives. IFPRI was organized as a District of Columbia non-profit, non-stock corporation on March 5, 1975 and its first research bulletin was produced in February 1976. IFPRI has offices in several developing countries, including China, Ethiopia, and India, and has research staff working in many more countries around the world. Most of the research takes place in developing countries in Central America, South America, Africa, and Asia.

IFPRI is part of a network of international research institutes funded in part by the CGIAR, which in turn is funded by governments, private businesses and foundations, and the World Bank.

IFPRI's institutional strategy rests on three pillars: research, capacity strengthening, and policy communication.

Research topics have included low crop and animal productivity, and environmental degradation, water management, fragile lands, property rights, collective action, sustainable intensification of agricultural production, the impact of climate change on poor farmers, the problems and opportunities of biotechnology,food security, micronutrient malnutrition, microfinance programs, urban food security, resource allocation within households, and school feeding in low-income countries.

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Answer 10

International trade and water

International trade and water is a term that is used to describe the relationship between international trade and the water being used by humans. The substantial increase in human population during the 20th century combined with rapid increases in overall global economic development has resulted in rising challenges for the future of public water management. The developing world has been particularly impacted by the lack of access to clean water. Each year, millions of people die due to illnesses, diseases, and lack the capital to create the infrastructure necessary to combat the problem. These conditions have increased the global demand for clean water and in turn, have pressured free market economists to suggest that wealthy market players are the most efficient solution to addressing water issues. Several nations can benefit from international trade in water. Particularly nations with excess fresh water and abundant capital are looking forward to making healthy profits from either the export of water to other nations, or are interested in the investment returns they will earn from participation in foreign markets. However, not everyone agrees that market forces are best capable of solving water issues. NGO’s, human rights organizations, and various stakeholders oppose viewing water in economic terms. These individuals accuse international trade agreements and international economic institutions including the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) of attempting to privatize a resource that they consider a basic human right. The lack of a common understanding of whether or not water should be viewed as a commodity or a basic human right has resulted in heated debates among legal professionals and leading members of the academia.

Prior to the industrial period, water had been extracted by whichever local community lived around it. As the industrial period progressed however, this view began to be replaced by a more economic oriented approach. Today, most water goes through a complicated industrial process that begins with its extraction and ends in a complicated process involving pipes, dams, and other sorts of unnatural facilities. Even fresh water that is located in rivers and lakes must somehow be extracted. In general these considerations involve the use of land, labor and capital thereby replacing the notion of a common resource into a value based product. Desalinization and desalinization plants play a major role also.

In 2000, out of the 40 IMF loans distributed 12 had requirements of partial or full privatization of water supplies.iv Likewise 50 percent of World Bank loans issued in 2002 to developing countries contained a clause that requested privatization of water services. In addition to international institutions pushing for privatization, trade agreements in the 20th century have also created the legal framework for allowing the sale of water. The GATS, known as the General Agreement on Trade in Services, operates on a list in approach, meaning it allows privatization in areas that the nation has agreed to open to other members. The Doha Development Round of negotiations aims at changing this stature. During these negotiations it was declared that no sector is to be excluded from the negotiations to the new agreement. If water services negotiations succeed then once a member chooses to open their markets to their own private sector, then will have to afford other members the same rights to invest in that sector. Many regional trade agreements do not have a list in approach and are therefore subject to the same conditions mentioned above. For example, in the US-CAFTA agreement only Costa Rica directly specified that water services were to be excluded from foreign investment the other nations made no similar request. Due to the mixed results obtained from privatization of water services and the difficulty of reversing that decision, several actors have strongly opposed the export of bulk fresh water. These actors claim that once such an action is allowed to occur then it will establish a precedent of treating water just like any other export. This in turn will become legally binding and irreversible.

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