FOOD POLICY OLD AND NEW

Abstract

The character of the food system and the nature of food policy are both changing, as urbanisation, technical change and the industrialisation of the food system transform the way food is produced, marketed and consumed in developing countries. The challenges are daunting and immediate – and need to be on the agenda of policy-makers throughout the developing world. Policy-makers are used to thinking about the food problem in developing countries in terms of ‘food security’. Their attention has been focused on hunger and malnutrition, food subsidies and feeding programmes, drought shocks and rehabilitation. Those concerns remain valid, especially in the poorest countries. At the same time, a new set of concerns is forcing its way onto the agenda. The changes are summarised in Box 1. Few countries conform exactly to the ‘old ’ or ‘new ’ characterisations in the table but most – including the poorest – are moving along a continuum from old to new. Urbanisation, industrialisation and globalisation mean that th