The food security continuum: a novel tool for understanding food insecurity as a range of experiences

The current lack of consensus on the relationships between hunger, malnutrition and food insecurity frustrates efforts to design good policies and programs to deal with the many problems. Disputes over terminology distract from the need for urgent action. This paper argues that our understanding of food insecurity is incremental: it develops as new research in a variety of food-deprived and nutrition-deprived contexts reveals causes, experiences and consequences and how they are interlinked. If we are to improve beneficiary selection, program targeting and intervention impact assessment, it is vital to coordinate our new understandings. The paper brings convergence to our understanding of food insecurity by introducing a new framework that visualizes levels of food insecurity, and the concomitant consequences and responses, as a continuum. Some potential benefits of using the continuum as a diagnostic tool are increased focus on less extreme but nevertheless urgent manifestations of food insecurity, more accurate targeting of interventions and better follow- up, and improved accountability for donor spending.http://link.springer.com/journal/12571hb201

Hearing community voices: grassroots perceptions of an intervention to support health volunteers in South Africa

With the scarcity of African health professionals, volunteers are earmarked for an increased role in HIV/AIDS management, with a growing number of projects relying on grassroots community members to provide home nursing care to those with AIDS – as part of the wider task-shifting agenda. Yet little is known about how best to facilitate such involvement. This paper reports on community perceptions of a 3-year project which sought to train and support volunteer health workers in a rural community in South Africa. Given the growing emphasis on involving community voices in project research, we conducted 17 discussions with 34 community members, including those involved and uninvolved in project activities – at the end of this 3-year period. These discussions aimed to elicit local people’s perceptions of the project, its strengths and its weaknesses. Community members perceived the project to have made various forms of positive progress in empowering volunteers to run a more effective home nursing service. However, discussions suggested that it was unlikely that these efforts would be sustainable in the long term, due to lack of support for volunteers both within and outside of the community. We conclude that those seeking to increase the role and capacity of community volunteers in AIDS care need to make substantial efforts to ensure that appropriate support structures are in place. Chief among these are: sustainable stipends for volunteers; commitment from community leaders and volunteer team leaders to democratic ideals of project management; and substantial support from external agencies in the health, welfare and NGO sectors. The full text of the article is on open access via the SAHARA website

Manejo tradicional de plantas em regiões neotropicais Traditional management of plants in the Neotropical region

É apresentada breve revisão sobre os principais aspectos do manejo tradicional de plantas exercidos nas regiões neotropicais, tendo como objetivos: 1. descrever como algumas populações tradicionais manejam seus recursos vegetais; 2. identificar as principais estratégias empregadas; 3. ressaltar a contribuição desse conhecimento para o desenvolvimento sustentável e manejo de recursos vegetais. São caracterizados e discutidos dois tipos de manipulação dos recursos vegetais: o de comunidade e o de espécies individuais. É possível verificar que os sistemas de conhecimento tradicional podem contribuir para o desenvolvimento sustentável, visto que algumas populações locais manejam as plantas com base em concepção sistêmica do ambiente e atitude de profunda reverência para com a natureza.<br>The main aspects of traditional plant management techniques exercised in the Neotropic are briefly reviewed. The aims of this work are: 1. to describe how some traditional populations, especially those located in Neotropical areas, manage natural resources; 2. to identify the main strategies employed; 3. to emphasize the contribution of traditional techniques to the sustainable development and management of natural resources. Two types of resource management are characterized and discussed: community management, and individual species management. In view of the fact that some traditional populations manage natural resources based on an integrated conception of nature, it is possible to verify that traditional knowledge systems can contribute to sustainable development