Food Security in Cambodia > What is Food
Security and Nutrition?
What is Food Security and Nutrition?
Food Security is commonly defined as
“When all people, at all times, have
physical and economic access to sufficient, safe, and nutritious food, and to
meet their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life”.
Conceptual Understanding of Food Security
Food must meet physiological requirements in terms of quantity, quality and
safety and must be socially and culturally acceptable. Food security is
determined at the macro, meso- and micro level by
availability (agricultural
production and marketing),
access (own income and transfer
incomes) and
use and utilisation (nutrition behavior, caring
practices, as well as health status and its determinants).
Stability
of availability, access and utilisation is a further important aspect.
The overall outcome for food security is the nutritional status of the
population. All three key elements (availability, access and utilisation of
food) are important for achieving a good nutritional status. Where the
nutritional status is low, there is no food security even though there might be
a surplus of food supply at the national or regional level.
It is also important to distinguish between transitory and chronic food
insecurity. Transitory food insecurity is either cyclical/ seasonal (e.g. rice
gaps during "lean season") or temporary (unpredictable shocks such as drought
and floods). Chronic food insecurity is where parts of the population
(vulnerable groups) are permanently not in a position to ensure their food
needs (coping mechanisms may be exhausted, e.g. due to depletion of assets).
Food security is a cross-cutting issue, and in a country such as Cambodia,
rural poverty and food insecurity are strongly interlinked. It is therefore
important to have an integrated approach linking the various sectors and actors
to improve the availability, access and use and utilisation of food.
The material in this section is based on the following
papers:
1. Rainer Gross; Hans Schoeneberger, Hans Pfeifer; Hans-Joachim A. Preuss, The
Four Dimensions of Food and Nutrition Security: Definitions and Concepts, April
2000.
2. Dr Herwig Hahn, Conceptual Framework of Food and Nutrition Security, April
2000.
|
Availability |
Access |
Use and
Utilisation |
Stability |
Conceptual Framework of
Malnutrition |
Measuring Food and
Nutrition Security |
Intervention
Tools & Instruments |