Food Security: Indicators, Measurement, and the Impact of Trade Openness

What are the implications of the WTO's Agreement on Agriculture for food security in poor countries? Are economic reforms and high growth rates in some countries protecting the well-being of the poor by improving the status of nutrition? Are we measuring hunger adequately? Do we need new tools and indicators? Does women's socio-economic status matter for child-health? Are targeted programmes successful in identifying and helping the truly needy? Despite the scale of human suffering inflicted by malnutrition, the fight against world hunger has recently been overshadowed by the campaign to end poverty. The emergence of the WTO and the freeing of agricultural trade, for example, have serious implications for hunger and food security in many countries, yet this is an area that is relatively understudied. This book aims to fill this gap by providing a significant collection of essays from mainstream academia and prominent international organizations working for food security. Examining food security across regions, the book tackles food security at three distinct levels-national, household, and individual. Other topics included are: attempts to improve measurement tools; the applications of existing tools for empirical analysis using household data, and; the impact of trade openness on national food security. Contributors to this volume - Shabd S. Acharya, Honorary Professor at IDS-Jaipur, Vice President of the National Academy of Agricultural Sciences, and President of the Agricultural Economics Research Association of India Mehmet Arda, Galatasaray University, Istanbul Kathleen Beegle, Development Research Group of the World Bank Calogero Carletto, Development Research Group of the World Bank Ramesh Chand, National Centre for Agricultural Economics and Policy Research, New Delhi Andrew Charman, Director, Sustainable Livelihood Consultants Benjamin Davis, Agricultural Development Economics Division, Food and Agriculture Organisation, UN Indranil Dutta, Department of Economics, University of Sheffield Samuel Gayi, Office of the Special Coordinator for Africa, UNCTAD, Geneva Nilabja Ghosh, Institute of Economic Growth (IEG) Basudeb Guha-Khasnobis, UNU-WIDER Craig Gundersen, Department of Human Development and Family Studies, Iowa State University Gautam Hazarika, University of Texas at Brownsville Michael Herrmann, UNCTAD, Division for Africa, Least Developed Countries and Special Programmes (ALDC) James Hodge, Genesis Analytics Marco Knowles, Food and Agriculture Organisation, UN Christian Romer Lovendal, Agriculture and Development Economics Division, Food and Agriculture Organisation, UN J. V. Meenakshi, HarvestPlus, International Food Policy Research Institute Mauro Migotto, OECD Vasco Molini, Centre for World Food Studies, Amsterdam George Rapsomanikis, Trade and Policy Service, Food and Agriculture Organisation, Trade and Markets Division Alexander Sarris, Food and Agriculture Organisation, Trade and Markets Division Brinda Viswanathan, Madras School of Economics