Structural transformation and food security : their mutual interdependence

A mutual, two-way dependence of structural transformation and food security has bedeviled the development profession for decades, which has often ignored the critical role of agricultural development and food price stability as the underlying foundations to both structural transformation and food security. Without a clear understanding of how these four topics are linked, food policy analysis, advising, design and implementation have usually been piecemeal and incomplete. Both academic and policy interest in these four topics stems from two distinct features of agricultural sectors in the early stages of development: (1) the sector tends to be the largest employer, producer of economic output, and earner of foreign exchange, and so gains in productivity among agricultural households are critical to broader gains in welfare and reduced poverty; and (2) typically a country’s agricultural sector is the main food producer. Both rural and urban food security depend heavily on the ability of farmers to produce significant surpluses, and on the marketing system to get this food to non-farm consumers. These two dimensions are linked, of course, and understanding the nature and dynamics of linkages among agricultural performance and broader stimulus to economic growth, reduced poverty and enhanced food security is a continuing challenge