Food System Shocks and Food Security Vulnerabilities: Moving Beyond Business As Usual I

The global food system has experienced a number of shocks recently, drawing renewed attention to global food security vulnerabilities. At the production and distribution end of the food supply chain (ie. the availability of food), the impact of wars in Yemen and Ukraine, severe climate events such as floods and fires and the impact of Covid-19 have added a new set of challenges. At the ‘consumption’ end (ie. access to food), many advanced capitalist economies are experiencing cost-of-living crises that impede access to safe, nutritious and sufficient food for many households.

Concerns about food security vulnerabilities are well founded. In 2021, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation’s State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World revealed that world hunger increased in 2020. Despite previous gains in food security, between 720 and 811 million people in the world experienced hunger in 2020, an increase of 161 million since 2019. At the same time, nearly 2.37 billion people lacked access to adequate food in 2020 – an increase of 320 million over a one-year period.

With availability and access to food simultaneously under threat, how do farmers, civil society, business, nation states and the global community respond to food security in the 2020s?

We invite papers that engage with the concept of food security in all of its forms, across different scales (global, national, local, household), perspectives and theoretical lenses.