Food security or self-sufficiency?

Food security is in the spotlight. There is increasing focus on food security due to global unrest, food shortages, climate change and other shocks such as the pandemic. More recently, at the NFU conference, the Prime Minister announced further commitments to food security reporting and funding for domestic production.

As food security is discussed more frequently, I often see it being confused with self-sufficiency and the terms used interchangeably. I think it is really important to separate the two terms and recognise that food security is a much broader topic, encompassing availability, access and utilisation of food.

Firstly, it is important to understand what food security is.

As defined at the 1996 World Food Summit, 

“food security exists when all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient safe and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy lifestyle”.

There are four dimensions to food security:

• Physical availability of food
• Economic and physical access to food
• Utilisation of food
• Stability

The definition of self-sufficiency is

“the ability of a region or country to produce enough food without needing to buy or import additional food”.

Self-sufficiency sits under the umbrella of food security, specifically under the ‘physical availability of food’ dimension. Self-sufficiency is just one part of the overall picture.

Technically, food security could exist without a high level of self-sufficiency, if trade was stable and provided a population with safe and nutritious food. However, food supply is much more complicated than that, which is why domestic production is also important.

Trade does contribute to providing a stable food supply and provides the variety of food preferences that the population demands. However, there are also risks associated with relying on trade due to various economic and political risks, and disruptions to the supply chain.

This is why self-sufficiency is considered an important part of food security, to reduce the potential shocks and risks associated with international trade. Alongside recognising the importance of both domestic production and trade, it is essential to consider the stability of food supply.

Stability is important considering risks and changes happening both domestically and on a global scale. Therefore, ensuring both trade and domestic production is sustainable both environmentally and economically is essential to ensuring food security.

Over the next few months, we will be exploring the topic of food security further and doing in-depth analyses into the various elements of food security to inform discussions and levy payers.