The Global Food Crisis: Law, Policy, and the Elusive Quest for Justice

Abstract

The right to food is recognized as a fundamental human right in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant on Economic Social and Cultural Rights, and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. Notwithstanding the obligation of states to respect, protect, and fulfill this right, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) reports that 1.02 billion people are chronically undernourished worldwide-a figure that represents onesixth of humanity. While fifteen million of the world's food insecure people are located in the Global North, the remaining billion reside in Asia, Africa, Latin America, the Pacific, and the Caribbean. The food crisis of 2008 propelled the issue of food security from the margins to the center of public debate, and focused the world's attention on the need for sustainable and equitable food production and distribution systems. From 2006 through 2008, skyrocketing food prices plunged an additional 115 million people into the ranks of the malnourished and provoked food riots across the globe. The immediate causes of the food crisis included adverse weather, high oil prices, rising worldwide meat consumption, growing demand for grain-based biofuels, and financial speculation in global commodity markets. Curiously, high food prices coincided with bumper cereal harvests in major food-producing nations and with hefty profits by the transnational corporations that dominate global food and agro-chemical markets. The FAO's 2009 report on global commodity markets pointed out that the food crisis was provoked primarily by escalating demand (notably demand for grain-based biofuels) rather than shrinking supply. Indeed, the world's food supply has kept pace with population growth for several decades. There is currently sufficient food to meet global nutritional needs, but many households are simply too poor to purchase the food that is available.