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Definition
We subscribe to the definition of food security adopted by
the FAO Committee on World Food Security: "All people
at all times have physical and economic access to the basic
foods they need."
Three key dimensions of food security are availability, access,
and utilization. To contribute to increased food availability,
CCRP projects work to boost agricultural productivity by alleviating
key cropping system constraints in a sustainable manner. Enhanced
productivity improves food access most directly when productivity-related
research improves the livelihoods of the poorest people. The
utilization dimension relates to nutritional outcomes; CCRP
projects are guided by the goal of enhancing the nutritional
status of the most vulnerable people.
CCRP’s project portfolio includes agricultural research
and development projects that encompass these various aspects
of food security, including those that:
- increase the resilience and stability of staple
food cropping systems in regions of high food insecurity
- focus on under-researched crops of regional and
strategic importance
- promote the viability of local seed systems and
the maintenance of crop genetic diversity
- enhance peoples’ ability to access food by
facilitating market opportunities or developing other means
of improving livelihoods
- improve peoples’ capacity to lead a healthy and productive
life by developing innovative and locally acceptable ways
of increasing the utilization of nutritious foods.
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Relevant CCRP projects
All CCRP projects.
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Relevant events
All conferences
and workshops.
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Relevant literature
Available on the Internet
There is considerable information about food security available
on the web. Here we provide some potentially useful links
below that may help those involved in agricultural research
improve and measure changes in food security and understand
the broader context related to food security.
United States Department of Agriculture's Food and Nutrition Technical Assistance (FANTA) information on food security
- Website: FANTA information on food security
- Description: This page gives a definition of food security and the three components (access, utilization and availability)
and provides links to helpful documents for measuring food security.
FANTA guide on measurement of food access
- Website: Household
Food Insecurity Access Scale (HFIAS) indicator guide
(2006, 311mb)
- Description: "FANTA has undertaken a set of activities
to identify a scientifically validated, simple, and more
user-friendly approach for measuring the impacts of Title
II programs on the access component of household food insecurity.
As a result of these activities, FANTA, in collaboration
with Cornell and Tufts Universities, has developed a Household
Food Insecurity Access Scale (HFIAS) measure and a guide,
with a standardized questionnaire and data collection and
analysis instructions. The HFIAS is composed of a set of
nine questions that have been used in several countries
and appear to distinguish food insecure from food secure
households across different cultural contexts. These questions
represent universal domains of the experience of insecure
access to food that can be used to assign households and
populations along a continuum of severity. The information
generated by the HFIAS can be used to assess the prevalence
of household food insecurity (access component) (e.g., for
geographic targeting) and to detect changes in the food
insecurity situation of a population over time (e.g., for
monitoring and evaluation). The questions can be added to
a standard baseline and final evaluation survey."
FANTA guides on measurement of dietary diversity and food insecurity
- Website: FANTA
guides on measurement of dietary diversity and food insecurity
(2005, 202kb and 181kb)
- Description: "In addition to work on the HFIAS, FANTA
has led an effort to identify additional indicators of the
access component of household food insecurity that are simple
to use and to develop methods to support the consistent
and comparable measurement and reporting of these indicators.
Two indicators have been identified as a result of this
process, which included extensive input by Title II implementing
partners: household dietary diversity score and months of
inadequate household food provisioning. Guides have been
developed for these indicators that provide a standardized
questionnaire with data collection and analysis instructions."
FANTA guide on measuring food consumption
- Website: FANTA
guide on measuring food consumption
(2004, 450kb)
- Description: "The guide describes the process and procedures
for collecting information to assess the food intake requirements
of a household and a step-by-step analysis of the food consumed.
Appendices present detailed information about analyzing
the data."
FANTA guide on measuring food access
- Website: FANTA
guide on measuring food access
(2003, 424kb)
- Description "The measurement of food access is critical
to food security programming… The objective of this study
was to review how Title II Development Assistance Programs
designs address food access, assess how Title II PVOs currently
monitors and evaluates food access and identify good measurement
practices. The results of the review will provide the basis
for a follow-on food access monitoring and evaluation guide
to be used by CS field staff."
IFPRI study on dietary diversity as an indicator of household
food security
- Website: IFPRI
study on dietary diversity
(2002)
- Description: "Both the report [173kb] and the technical
note [108kb] describe a user-friendly, cost-effective approach
to measuring changes in dietary quantity and quality and
feeding behaviors at both the household and individual levels.
Dietary diversity, defined as the number of unique foods
consumed over a given period of time, appears to show promise
as a means of measuring food security and monitoring changes,
particularly when resources for such measurement are scarce.
As described in the report, FANTA's subcontractor, the International
Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), analyzed ten household
data sets (collected in India, Mozambique, Mexico, Bangladesh,
Egypt, Mali, Malawi, Ghana, Kenya and the Philippines) to
assess whether dietary diversity can be used as a tool in
evaluating the efficacy of food security interventions.
The study validated the dietary diversity indicator as a
measure of access to food (per capita expenditures) and
a measure of consumption (caloric availability at the household
level)."
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Relevant links
Eldis food security resource guide
- Website: ELDIS
food security resource guide
- Description: This site, based out of the Institute for Development Studies
(linked to the University of Sussex in the UK), has food security
statistics, country profiles, definitions of related concepts
and useful web links.
International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) Household
Food Security and Gender topics pages
Development Gateway's topic page on food security
- Website: Development
Gateway's food security
- Description: The Development Gateway is an independent
foundation (originally founded by the World Bank) aimed
at improving developing countries' effective use of the
Internet by "increasing access to critical information,
building local capacity and bringing partners together for
positive change." This website provides news, resources
and links to other sites on food security.
Overseas Development Institute's forum for food security
in Southern Africa
- Website: ODI's
forum for food security in Southern Africa
- Description: This website, which was initiated following the food crisis
in Southern Africa in 2001-02, "is to provide a platform
for improved linkages between food security analysis, policy
making and implementation in the Southern Africa region. The
outputs of country issues papers, regional theme papers, international
electronic discussions and country policy seminars are intended
to generate insights and policy options drawing on longitudinal
research in the region and comparative international evidence
that it is hoped will prove useful to stakeholders. It covers
the region as a whole and five specific countries: Lesotho,
Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia and Zimbabwe. It has brought together
those in government, official donors, NGOs, civil society,
the private sector, and international and regional researchers
concerned with food security."
Food security and food policy information portal for Africa
- Website: Food
security and food policy information portal for Africa
- Description: This directory is being developed by Michigan State University
and has an objective: "to assist country/region-specific
African food security and food policy researchers to:
a. Find important and high quality Internet sources of data
and information to assist in their country/topic analytical
work;
b. Offer to others in Africa (and elsewhere) important country/topic
level work they are doing;
c. Improve their professional skills for research and policy
outreach. This includes online tutorials and downloadable
training materials on conducting research quality and "deep"
Internet searching to find new data and information that
is constantly and increasingly becoming available in digital
format via the Internet."
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