Symposium 5: Integrated Food Systems for Food Security in a Changing World Environment

ABSTRACT: Thirty years ago, roughly 80% of Africans and Asians lived in rural environments, many sustained by subsistence farming. It was then logical for development agencies to give priority to raising harvest yields of the crops on which most poor people's food security depended. Today almost half of all Africans and Asians live in urban communities, expanding at between 3.5% and 4.5% per year. Food security for densely populated mega-cities cannot be assured simply by raising crop and livestock production. Assured access to an adequate food supply demands complex, integrated food systems: the planned, controlled integration of production with post-production systems, and these must embrace all critical components and activities from on-farm production to ultimate consumers. Diagnosis of existing patterns of production, preservation, processing, and distribution, followed by design of more efficient systems, calls for professional food systems analysts. Recent experience in India and South Africa illustrates how integrated food systems can contribute to sustained food security and stable employment in rural agribusiness.