When Food Sufficiency And Food Security Collide With Each Other!

When you can command your mind to relax amidst external chaos and internal conflict, an Aha! Moment can come.

It happened to me some 7 minutes ago as I write this line at 1634 hours Easter Sunday. I had been thinking blank, not of the Enhanced Community Quarantine, more popularly referred to as the Coronavirus Lockdown of Luzon, Philippines.

Yes, on Easter Sunday 2020, 12 April 2020, a beautiful pair of thoughts comes to me, parallel to each other at that!

You know, there are 2 people in aggie science whose very different fields of leadership I admire, and they are both Ilocanos. You have to forgive me, because I am Ilocano. One favors Food Security, and the other favors Food Sufficiency. Whom should I favor? (images: food “security” from Shutterstock[1]; food “sufficiency” from Defimedia[2])

Yes, as my title this time says it, the serendipitous moment came, whispering to me:

About the stark, simple, memorable, distinguishable
difference between food security and food sufficiency.

First, you will note that food is the paramount consideration during the lockdown. It just occurred to me:

(1)   When you want to purchase all the food your money can buy.
Is that food security?

(2)   When you want to purchase just the food you need for a week.
Is that food sufficiency?

Careful now!

Your first problem actually is: What’s the difference between “security” and “sufficiency” as terms?

From the American Heritage Dictionary[3]:

Security,. Freedom from doubt, anxiety, or fear; confidence.

Sufficiency, An adequate amount or quantity.

Clear enough? The difference in the official positions of those 2 gentlemen in my short list of leaders personally admired may be explained as mistaken interpretations of the economic terms “food security” and “food sufficiency”!

When you purchase all the food that you can afford, you may believe that now you have food security – because you have everything you want in the confines of your family compound.

Ah Sir! When you buy one time every food item you think you need for the duration of the lockdown, you are hoarding – that is food “security” only for your family. What about the other families who cannot afford to follow your example?

Here’s my advice:

Food sufficiency: Grow all the food you need.
Food security: Grow some, buy some.

In the broader view of food security, which must apply because we belong to a society and not just family, food is secure or safe if the Philippines can import at any time any type of food it needs, including rice. We feel secure that we can import from 1 or 2 or 3 countries the amount or kind of food we do not produce but need, following international treaties, following the dictate of international commerce.

Now then, from now on I will not say I disagree with you when you say you favor food sufficiency over food security, or vice versa. Why? I will simply tell myself – you are mistaken, my friend; it’s an honest economic language mistake. Your sin is forgiven!@517

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[1] https://www.shutterstock.com/search/food+security

[2] https://defimedia.info/national-food-security-governments-strategic-plan-towards-self-sufficiency

[3] https://www.thefreedictionary.com/Sufficiency