poverty with added vitamins? competing ways to govern the world food system’ raj patel
TRANSCRIPT
Poverty With Added Vitamins?Competing Ways To Govern
The World Food System
Raj PatelResearch Professor
Lyndon B Johnson School of Public Affairs University of Texas at Austin
Which is the most important agricultural technology?
1. the plough2. fencing3. the seed drill 4. inorganic fertilizer5. genetically modified crops
•19th century21st century
TECHNOLOGY OF EXCLUSION
Source: UK Ordnance Survey
Global Ecological Footprint:Cheap Nature
Davis, Steven J., and Ken Caldeira. 2010. "Consumption-based accounting of CO2 emissions." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 107 (12):5687-92.
Cheap Workers need Cheap Food needs Cheap Nature
Credit: Mike Mozart (cc v2 license)
THE FOOD INDUSTRY
New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition
Source: The Guardian
Business Alliance for Food and Fortification
• ‘Companies already own the right technology to make a difference as well as the distribution channels and communication networks’
Business Alliance for Food and Fortification 2005
Source: ONE (2013)
Malawi’s Key Commitments
1. Improved score on Doing Business Index to top 100 countries
2. Increased dollar value of private sector investment in the agriculture sector and value added agro-processing
3. Increased private investment in commercial production, sale of inputs and produce and value addition
Some specific commitments to the New Alliance
Source: New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition
So Why is it Called the New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition?
Source: Kevin Dooley/Flickr, Nishan Bichajian/MIT Libraries
The Era of Poverty with Added Vitamins
Malawi’s Problem in 2000
• Life expectancy : 46 years old• HIV/AID Prevalence: 14%• Child malnutrition (stunting): 50%• GDP/Capita: $150
Soils, Food and Healthy Communities Project, Malawi
Source: Raj Patel, Rachel Bezner Kerr, Lizzie Shumba, Laifolo Dakishoni. 2015. Cook, Eat, Man, Woman: The New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition, Nutritionism and its Alternatives from Malawi. Journal of Peasant Studies, 42(1)
Results
• Sanitation & Healthcare• Grain Storage• Credit facilities• Climate change enterprise• Child Malnutrition Clinic closes• Cost $8/person/year
Source: Smith, Lisa C., and Lawrence Haddad. 2015. "Reducing Child Undernutrition: Past Drivers and Priorities for the Post-MDG Era." World Development 68 (0):180-204. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2014.11.014.
Food Sovereignty &Agroecology
• Everyone is a scientist-entrepreneur-activist-cook
• Contributive justice• Peer-to-peer• Joyful and tough• Internalised social and environmental costs• Re-learning the commons• Challenge power and inequality
Questions• What’s your theory
of change?• What happens to
corporate power?• What happens to
private property?
Gandhi on Salt March
