Global Forum on Food Security and Nutrition (FSN Forum)

This member contributed to:

    • This is a wonderfully comprehensive report which draws in so many facets that influence FSN around the world. I am pleased to see consideration for Indigenous food security in the US and Canada as well as emphasis on agency and a diversity of knowledges in the recommendations. I hope my suggestions will further add to the broad expertise captured in this document.

      There is no mention of food sovereignty throughout the report. There is wide debate in the literature about addressing marginalized and colonized community disparity through the lens of food security or food sovereignty. When I originally learned about the 6-pillar approach, I thought, “yes!” there is finally come integration between the two!  I really like the 6-pillar food security concept as it brings in components of decision making, agency over land and resources, Indigenous stewardship, food choice, power etc. These are all elements of food sovereignty. I think this should be recognized in the paper. Food sovereignty is still the primary agent and preference for Indigenous communities in the United States and Canada as it embodies relationships with environment, food, and culture better than food security. It is also the lens that many Indigenous scholars consider issues raised in this report as Indigenous food security cannot achieved without food sovereignty. See:

      Coté, Charlotte. "“Indigenizing” food sovereignty. Revitalizing Indigenous food practices and ecological knowledges in Canada and the United States." Humanities 5.3 (2016): 57.

      Whyte, K.P. 2017 Food Sovereignty, Justice and Indigenous Peoples: An Essay on Settler Colonialism and Collective Continuance. Oxford Handbook on Food Ethics. Edited by A. Barnhill, T. Doggett, and A. Egan. Oxford University Press.

      The measure of sustainability on page 28 seems solely focused on cultivated food, food security and nutrition also includes wild foods.

      The part on FSN by ethnicity is buried in the section on gender. This is an important component to consider. I recommend giving it its own header.

      Pg 43 Second to last paragraph: “Older Indigenous adults have a 5-7 times higher risk of experiencing food security compared to their non-Indigenous counterparts (Temple and Russell, 2018).” I suspect food security should be food insecurity.

      Native Americans in the United States have some of the highest rates of food and nutrition insecurity in the US. That needs to be mentioned as part of the second to last paragraph on page 43. AI/AN are often left out of USDA reporting as they are not adequately surveyed. Mentioning the role that settler colonialism and denial of land and traditional foods in Indigenous food insecurity in the US and Canada would also be important for context.

      See:

      Jernigan, V. B. B., Huyser, K. R., Valdes, J., & Simonds, V. W. (2017). Food Insecurity Among American Indians and Alaska Natives: A National Profile Using the Current Population Survey–Food Security Supplement. Journal of Hunger and Environmental Nutrition, 12(1), 1-10. https://doi.org/10.1080/19320248.2016.1227750

      Sowerwine, J., Mucioki, M., Sarna-Wojcicki, D., & Hillman, L. (2019). Reframing food security by and for Native American communities: a case study among tribes in the Klamath River basin of Oregon and California. Food Security, 11(3), 579-607

      Pg 48 The section on Indigenous Peoples in US and Canada and land inequity: I recommend drawing in more focus on waves of land cessions by Tribes to settlers in return for often unfulfilled treaties, land grabbing by land grant universities, National Forests, relocation to ecological stressed land with greater implications for environmental change today etc. to demonstrate the truly diminishing land base. In addition to land, ability to harvest food and steward landscapes widely varies by Tribe with those who continue to live in their Aboriginal homelands lacking agency and jurisdiction to traditional foods. In its current form, this section more emphasizes relationship with land and resources which is a core concept of food sovereignty. Access to land and foods from that land are key to both food sovereignty and security but this section fails to directly address the root of land inequality and the one going struggle to access traditional territories still today

      See:

      https://www.hcn.org/issues/52.4/indigenous-affairs-education-land-grab-universities

      Farrell, J., Burow, P. B., McConnell, K., Bayham, J., Whyte, K., & Koss, G. (2021). Effects of land dispossession and forced migration on Indigenous peoples in North America. Science, 374(6567), eabe4943.

      It would be nice for some of the content on land inequities related to Indigenous people in the global north to be carried over to some components of the “Implications of inequalities for FSN”. A lack of land has grave implications for the ability of Tribes to access traditional foods as well as grave implications on the availability and health of those foods due to fractured Indigenous stewardship and nurturing. There are similar implications for sustainability of ecosystems. Without land, agency over food and nutrition is impossible, inhibiting true agency over diet.

      See again: Sowerwine, J., Mucioki, M., Sarna-Wojcicki, D., & Hillman, L. (2019). Reframing food security by and for Native American communities: a case study among tribes in the Klamath River basin of Oregon and California. Food Security, 11(3), 579-607