A recently released Special Report by the International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food Systems (IPES Food) on how geopolitical trends impact food systems has cited CARICOM’s food security initiative as an example of cooperative approaches to building resilient self-reliance in the current environment.
Resilient self-reliance combines resilience (the ability to withstand and recover from shocks) with food self-reliance (the capacity to meet food needs with domestic production and cooperative trade).
The Report, titled ‘The New Geopolitics of Food: Navigating policies for resilient self-reliance‘, explores how trade wars, conflicts, climate change, aid cuts, and political tensions are fuelling price volatility, worsening hunger, and strengthening corporate control, and provides recommendations on the way forward, including through cooperative approaches, market management mechanisms, and policy reform.
“Cooperative approaches are already emerging amid agrifood trade chaos. For example, Member States of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) have been exploring more regional food strategies to improve food system resilience within the Region and reduce dependence on food imports. At the same time, growing calls have been made for price stabilization through the creation of global buffer stocks – both virtual and physical – which could support national and regional public reserves, and enable public actors to engage in market management at the global level through commodity derivatives markets,” the Report said in Chapter 3, which focuses on Resilient Self-Reliance in A Volatile World.
Please read the Report here.
About Vision 25 X 25 + 5
Vision 25 by 2025 is a regional strategy to reduce the CARICOM Region’s food import bill by 25% by 2030. This strategy is a long-term partnership between CARICOM Member States, the private sector, regional organisations, producer groups, development partners, and civil society. It aims to reduce food insecurity, improve intra-regional trade, and create wealth and economic opportunities for all CARICOM Member States. The initiative is spearheaded by President of Guyana, His Excellency Dr Mohamed Irfaan Ali – Lead Head of Government with responsibility for agriculture, agricultural diversification, and food security in the CARICOM Quasi-Cabinet – and guided by a Special CARICOM Ministerial Task Force on Food Production and Food Security.
