Small Farming and Food and Nutrition Security

Abstract

Among the food system's outcomes, food and nutrition security remains a key concern also in developed countries. This chapter analyzes food and nutrition security issues, unpacking the four dimensions in which the concept is articulated: availability, access, utilization and stability. Then the concept is explored, beyond the official definitions, through a description of the various frames that shape the public debate on food and nutrition security. These frames are: the classical productivist view emerged in the early post-war period; the neoproductivism, promoting a sustainable intensification aimed at producing more food while reducing negative environmental impacts, the entitlement approach based on Sen's reflections on people's capability to access food; the food sovereignty (Via Campesina, 1996) which regards food insecurity as an outcome of unequal power relations: the livelihood approach focused on the assets that determine the living gained by the individual or household; the right to food (De Schutter, 2014) based on the status of each individual as a rights-holder; the similar but less individualistic food democracy and food citizenship perspective which focusses on the collective dimension of those rights; the community food security, again close to the food citizenship but with stronger emphasis on communities and localization. Finally, the main contributions given by small farms to food and nutrition security are described, as identified on the base of the SALSA project outcomes.

Citation

Brunori, G., Avermaete, T., Bartolini, F., Brzezina, N., Grando, S., Marsden, T., Mathijs, E., Moragues-Faus, A. and Sonnino, R. (2020), "Small Farming and Food and Nutrition Security", Brunori, G. and Grando, S. (Ed.) Innovation for Sustainability (Research in Rural Sociology and Development, Vol. 25), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 19-38. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1057-192220200000025004