Food Security and Food Sovereignty in the Global South. Key Problematics in the Pursuit of Food Sovereignty Visions (PDF)

Essay aus dem Jahr 2019 im Fachbereich Politik - Internationale Politik - Region: Afrika, Note: 1,3, Universität Bayreuth, Veranstaltung: Geographies of Environment and Development, Sprache: Deutsch, Abstract: This essay discusses the key problematics in the pursuit of food sovereignty in the Global South.
The definition of the concept of food sovereignty has been confronted to change since the beginning of its existence. During the 90s, La Via Campesina was the pioneer movement to formulate the fight for food sovereignty. The movement was created in response to the observation that large peasant groups have been excluded from the decision-making and development process of the international food system, especially from the Uruguayan rounds of GATT negotiations on agriculture. Hence, that was an explicit reaction against the neo-liberal agricultural policies.

At that time, national independence in terms of food security was set as a prior goal of La Via Campesina's agenda. Therefore, they mostly focused on food sufficiency because they understood this goal as one substantial right of each nation to foster and evolve its agricultural production system. In this sense, every nation should be capable to produce the necessary food amount to feed its population within its respective territory.