OPINION: MULTI-DIMENSIONAL APPROACH TO ACHIEVE FOOD SECURITY IN AFRICA

The food security challenge remains an urgent need as long as the human race exists because of the continuous pursuit of food. Food security challenge is understood to be an agricultural production, economic, social, environmental, political and health challenge thus, a multifaced view.

Consequently, understanding and addressing the food security challenge requires multidimensional approaches. Addressing this challenge means establishing environmentally, socially and economically sustainable pathways of production, and distribution of food (food systems).

Sustainability is strongly tied to food security because the food challenge should not only be solved for the now, but also for the future. Various countries, multi-national institutions and organisations as well as local actors have suggested and mapped out diverse pathways of achieving food security. Thus, addressing the food security challenge becomes a highly contested issue. However, these strategies cannot be used with a blanket approach due to diversity of the nature and contexts of the food security challenge. Moreover, little progress has been achieved in contrast to the multifaceted actions suggested and taken in effort to attain food security.

Limited progress on food security can be attributed to several factors. Firstly, there seem to be a commodification of the food security challenge. By this I mean that the food security issue is being used as a pathway for income generation and proliferation for various institutions. Beneficiaries to this commodification include multinational organisations which get sponsorships to work of research and action towards food security as well as host conventions where they discuss food security. Even though such conventions have their own role to play towards policy, it remains worrying when there is little progress being achieved across the globe such that one remains wondering about the purpose of such institutions. Discussions which do not translate to progressive change towards attaining food security do not carry much significance but rather make the food security challenge a big business on its own.

Research organisations and higher institutions of learning are also beneficiaries of the commodification of the food security challenge in that, by taking up the research agenda, they are more likely to get access to funding needed for research. However, funding comes with conditions and channel the course of the research according to the funders preference which might not be an urgent need in that context. If research does not translate to local action, it remains knowledge in the towers of institutions, with no meaning on the ground. Thus, for research to make meaningful contribution to addressing food security challenges, there in need for co-production of knowledge by local actors such that both the researcher and actors develop the research agenda and are both involved in the process as well as the implementation of the findings. Research findings need to reach the relevant people on the ground and implement the recommendations in practise for it to be meaningful. This speaks to the disconnect between research and practice.

Speaking of disconnect, the linkages between public and private sector need to transcend from the office confinements to practice.   Even though planning and policy is made at high level, people centredness should be crucial. The voice of the people should be truly represented in these processes, not as mere participant but actors, to ensure that proposed solution contextually resonate with the local communities. Local communities should craft their won pathways of solving the food security challenge within their own space. Civil society organisations are key in this space but nevertheless require the argumentation of their efforts by state actors.

Governments and political institutions have been involved in commodification of food security challenge by making it a political issue. The recent conflict between Russian and Ukraine has buttressed the political nature of food security challenge and the unsustainable nature of the current global food system. On top of this, numerous country leaders in Africa have been involved in use of food security as an agenda for politicking with no real intention of making this a reality. For example, giving food parcels to those affiliated with a particular political party.  Such operations exacerbate food security challenge due to exclusion and alienation those of an opposing view from benefiting from state food security initiatives. The government should instead play an active role in addressing food security challenges in Africa because their mandate is to respond to the social and security needs of the people in that country. Governments cannot leave the role of addressing food security to Non-Governmental Organisations and private sector as this will be suicidal to the people. This is because NGOs have their various agendas whilst private institutions are mostly driven by profit. This calls for joint forces as food security is everyone business and none should be left behind.

We cannot discuss food security with the exclusion of agriculture. It is crucial for African government to drive agricultural production and encourage small-scale farming for the purpose of household food security. Food security challenge in Africa is mostly pronounced at household level as compared to national level where the secure household overshadow those insecure. As such food insecurity is highly expressed across rural household and those within informal settlements in urban areas. The above-mentioned households share the low income characteristic and are usually marginalised. In these areas the food security challenge relates to inequality, social injustice and individual dignity. For example, in South Africa, the inherited colonial disparities mean marginalisation of black people within the less productive lands which were tagged as homeland. That on its own reflect issues around ownership, access and utilisation of productive land. The one who own the resources of production dictates what, how, how much and when is produced. Addressing food security in this context speaks to ensuring access to productive agricultural land which do not require high level input use for small scale farmers. 

Furthermore, the colonisation of African countries changed the food systems within the region. This has resulted in the abandonment of some of the local indigenous food crops, which are healthy and nutritious, and agricultural practises, which are conservational and hardy, towards the Eurocentric ways of doing things. Household own production of food ensure a cheaper, accessible and diversified nutrition and source of food for rural households.  The calls for individual household rethinking of the way we do agricultural production in efforts to colonise agricultural production and decision making.  At country level, government should support production if indigenous crops as well as the indigenous practises. It is also key to encourage urban household food gardens for those withing the urban spaces. Though all these recommendations should take into consideration the issues of sustainability.

Undoubtably, smallholder farming cannot be left to vanish. These play a critical role towards achieving of food security through local food production, particularly addressing the challenge of access to safe and nutritious foods. For example, during the Covid pandemic, travel restrictions limited access to food markets, thus highlighting the importance of local food production. Relying on markets further marginalises the poor in that the only food they can get is what is accessible to them on the market. Such food is usually cheap, poor quality and of low nutritional value, and they do not have any control over.

In conclusion, considering the diversity of the food security challenge discussed above, the proposed solutions need to be multidimension. As such, African countries should focus on achieving food sovereignty. With food sovereignty the food systems will be ecologically sound and sustainable, being cognisant of local realities, sociocultural and environmental conditions in production, distribution, consumption and policies. The same Covid 19 pandemic and the current war in Ukraine has taught us the need for every country to be food self-reliant. Countries should target at taking back their food power so that the stances and decisions made are not a consequence of the need to remain food secure.

By Kabiti HM

Risk and Vulnerability Science Centre,

Walter Sisulu University