Redefining the Concept of Food Security

MAC/WFY

Page-428

0230_553559_45_cha41

428

Assessment. The Graveyard of Aspirations

that his organization was not recommending any anti-trade stance but to point to
the need to strengthen the creative forces of the market. Free-market campaigners
have attacked the UNCTAD report on grounds that its advice would lead to lower
living standards and create inefficient industries that would ill-serve consumers in
developing countries.

UNCTAD insists that it has close links with WTO, with which it signed a memor-

andum in 2003 providing for co-operation and joint studies. But WTO is seen by
developing countries to have a very different aim and philosophy, which favour
the rich countries. UNCTAD's call for a level playing field in trade and develop-
ment harks back to the work of both Singer and Prebisch. But UNCTAD's powers
of persuasion have been muted by the work of other UN bodies, particularly the
IMF and the World Bank, and by the creation of WTO.

Human security

Human security was on the international agenda well before the al-Qaeda terrorists
flew the passenger planes into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New
York and the Pentagon in Washington, DC on 11 September 2001, described as
a `defining moment' in the history of the modern world, and triggering the war
on international terrorism. It also carried further the debate on redefining the
concepts and relationship between human security and food security. Up to the
late 1980s, the concept of security was more narrowly interpreted as security of
territory from external aggression or global security from the threat of nuclear
holocaust (Clay and Stokke, 2000). With the end of the Cold War and the break
up of the imposed political structure of the former Soviet Union, a broadening
of the concept occurred as the number of conflicts within, not between, states
increased.

This process was taken further by the NorthSouth Dialogue of the Society for

International Development at a high-level meeting on `The Economics of Peace',
held in Costa Rica in 1990. The meeting called for a new concept of global security
that focused not on military security but on `the overall security of individuals
from social violence, economic distressed and environmental degradation' and
sought to focus attention on the obstacles to `realization of the full potential
of individuals' (MacFarlane and Khong, 2006). This transformation was captured
and redefined further in the annual UNDP Human Development Reports (HDR) that
began in 1990. The HDR for 1994 introduced a concept of human security that
had two elements:

· safety from chronic threats such as hunger, disease and repression; and
· protection from sudden and hurtful disruptions in the pattern of daily life

(UNDP, 1994).

This concept explicitly linked human security with the development process. It

allowed people to exercise their expanded choices and develop their capabilities.
Conversely, the absence of such security undermined the process of development

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Useful links	Redefining the Concept of Food Security MAC/WFY Page-428 0230_553559_45_cha41 428 Assessment. The Graveyard of Aspirations that his organization was not recommending any anti-trade stance but to point to the need to strengthen the creative forces of the market. Free-market campaigners have attacked the UNCTAD report on grounds that its advice would lead to lower living standards and create inefficient industries that would ill-serve consumers in developing countries. UNCTAD insists that it has close links with WTO, with which it signed a memor- andum in 2003 providing for co-operation and joint studies. But WTO is seen by developing countries to have a very different aim and philosophy, which favour the rich countries. UNCTAD's call for a level playing field in trade and develop- ment harks back to the work of both Singer and Prebisch. But UNCTAD's powers of persuasion have been muted by the work of other UN bodies, particularly the IMF and the World Bank, and by the creation of WTO. Human security Human security was on the international agenda well before the al-Qaeda terrorists flew the passenger planes into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington, DC on 11 September 2001, described as a `defining moment' in the history of the modern world, and triggering the war on international terrorism. It also carried further the debate on redefining the concepts and relationship between human security and food security. Up to the late 1980s, the concept of security was more narrowly interpreted as security of territory from external aggression or global security from the threat of nuclear holocaust (Clay and Stokke, 2000). With the end of the Cold War and the break up of the imposed political structure of the former Soviet Union, a broadening of the concept occurred as the number of conflicts within, not between, states increased. This process was taken further by the NorthSouth Dialogue of the Society for International Development at a high-level meeting on `The Economics of Peace', held in Costa Rica in 1990. The meeting called for a new concept of global security that focused not on military security but on `the overall security of individuals from social violence, economic distressed and environmental degradation' and sought to focus attention on the obstacles to `realization of the full potential of individuals' (MacFarlane and Khong, 2006). This transformation was captured and redefined further in the annual UNDP Human Development Reports (HDR) that began in 1990. The HDR for 1994 introduced a concept of human security that had two elements: · safety from chronic threats such as hunger, disease and repression; and · protection from sudden and hurtful disruptions in the pattern of daily life (UNDP, 1994). This concept explicitly linked human security with the development process. It allowed people to exercise their expanded choices and develop their capabilities. Conversely, the absence of such security undermined the process of development back to top Next page
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