Arab food security: vulnerabilities and pathways

Presentation 1: It reviewed the major vulnerabilities facing the Arab region as outlined in the 2020 publication entitled “Arab Food Security: Vulnerabilities and Pathways” building on the Arab Food Security Monitoring Framework. Food insecurity is a high concern as seen through the 3 core indicators of the framework with many of the 21 explanatory indicators showing poor performance as well. It also noted that the region’s natural resource scarcity is increasing with the impact of climate change on the rise. The pandemic had a negative effect on the food availability due to the measures taken by countries to overcome its impact.

Presentation 2: It overviewed a few key takeaways as related to the complexity of ensuring food security and the role of well-functioning food systems. It then outlined a few broad recommendations related to building resilience, strengthening the food security base, and addressing overarching issues such as macroeconomic difficulties, conflicts, and the need for greater regional integration. It noted that substantial subsidies are being spent in the region which constrains public budgets while they could be harnessed to finance food security and the SDGs for greater impact. Two questions for further discussion were suggested, which related to the likely evolution of the food security status over the next couple of years and the kind of policies that are needed to address food security in the short-, medium- and long-run.

Presentation 3: It provided an overview of the Arab Program for Sustainable Food Security, which has 8 components distributed over 3 levels: boosting food production, investments and enhancing nature to improve food security. It also outlines specific goals and targets that cover many aspects encouraging national investments to diversify food consumption. The program is expected to be implemented through 2 consecutive phases from 2021-2025 and from 2026 to 2030.

Briefings were provided on the prevailing food security situation in Morocco, Algeria, and Lebanon. Each highlighted critical indicators showing the level of food production and food security in the concerned countries as well a succinct overview of supporting programmes being implemented and how they support the achievement of food security. These were put in the context of recent food market disruptions caused by many factors including the COVID-19 pandemic as well as the Ukrainian war.

• The discussions highlighted the need to invest more in the agriculture sector to increase productivity to achieve sustainable agricultural development to enhance resilience for food security. Food systems have to become more responsive to arising crises including national, regional global conflicts and disruptions.
• Countries should work to protect and improve agricultural lands and to develop adequate irrigation capacity. Several million hectares of arable lands exist in the Arab region though less than 50% of this land is used for agriculture production and usually with low productivity.
• Poverty rates are increasing in most countries because of the impact of high food prices and inflation while job opportunities and income growth remain stagnant or even decreasing.
• Food sovereignty is essential and needs to be considered. It would help reduce the vulnerability on food security due to changes on the world food market. The global finance market could be tapped upon to finance food security and create a pathway for sustainable food systems and healthy diets. There would be a need to look into how to harmonize the use of subsidies to better support people in need and farmers.
• Nowadays, people are tempted to buy cheaper products while overlooking the fact that they may lack nutritious elements which could increase the level of obesity and undernourishment.
• The cases of Palestine and Yemen were also highlighted because of their current conflicts which has a direct impact on their food security stability and status and the increase in food commodities prices.