Henry Chingaipe, PhDIPRSE

outlineIntroductionConceptualising food security in MalawiImplications of the conceptualisation of food

securityFS governance: Policy debates and actorsSome critical policy/governance issues

Land use and land reformsInput programmesParastatal ActorsDonors and the food Security Agenda

Introduction

FS is firmly established itself on Malawi’s national agenda as the most visible and sensitive public policy issue

Malawians have continued to identify FS with national self-sufficiency in maize production

Maize availability and affordability dominate policy discourses on FS and are contested across the political divide and between donors and Malawian political and technocratic authorities.

Intro cont’dFS questions have led to food electioneering FS has partly made the legitimacy of the

state or government somewhat dependent on or linked to maize availability and affordability.

The objective of this presentation is to do a quick a synopsis of the state of food security governance in Malawi

Conceptualising food security• Food security means different things to

different policy analysts• Generally defined as the state “when all people

at all times have both physical and economic access to sufficient food to meet their dietary needs for a productive and healthy life”

• Essential elements are the availability of food and the ability of people to acquire it

• Food insecurity means the lack of access to enough food and it takes two forms, namely chronic and transitory.

Conceptualising contdChronic food insecurity is a continuous inability to acquire

enough nutritious food even when there is no general decline in food availability.

Transitory food insecurity is a temporary decline in the ability of people to access enough food

MGDS frames FS as a prerequisite for sustained economic growth and poverty reduction

key elements of FS availability, access and utilisation.

All three are in cause-effect relationships with poverty levels so much that vulnerability is a cross-cutting variable. How these four interact give a food insecurity situation its unique character.

Conceptualising food Security in Malawi

policy and governance implications

Food insecurity as a public policy problem is simply a mess: multiple causes, multiple actors and multiple partial solutions.

FS requires a holistic and inclusive implementation approach: multi-sector efforts, central and local levels, and among governmental, NGO, private sector and donor communities. It requires a cross-sector approach.

A cross-sector coalition for FS requires political capital and the technical capacity to coordinate FS and safety nets across ministries, agencies and actors outside the state.

 

Implications cont’dThe FS components in Malawi are highly

interrelated because of large dependence on small holder agriculture

In the long term, sustainable food security is dependent on the levels of socio-economic development.

Short term strategies that alleviate hunger and vulnerability must be in sync with long term strategies for economy wide economic growth and development. Achieving the balance is not necessarily easy.

 

Policy debates on food securityThe first one is rooted in state-market debate. The

sticky issue is whether to rely on laissez-faire market solutions to ensure access to food and to reduce vulnerability or on economic entitlements and state-managed interventions.

Recent FS achievements show that the choice is not about perfect markets over imperfect states or perfect state over imperfect markets. It is about treading the narrow aisle between imperfect markets and an imperfect state.

This requires sensitivity to the political economy context and policy pragmatism that is not beholden to economic dogmas

Policy debate cont’dThe second debate is about whether national

self-sufficiency in maize should be the goal. Proponents argue that a landlocked country in

a politically unstable and volatile part of the world must hedge against potential interruptions to maize imports. Thus there must be increased household production.

This approach runs counter to a strong push for export-led agriculture that would expand the revenue base and create new industries to get people out of subsistence maize production into a range of income generating activities

Policy debate cont’dThis debate represents a ‘social dilemma’ i.e.

a collective action problem that arises when the rational pursuit of narrow or sectional interests results in collective irrationality.

ASWAP presents a potentially viable mechanism for a mutual settlement of this and other policy issues.

In the meantime, maize self-sufficiency continues to be the primary public policy goal vis-a-vis food security (time horizons for politicians and poor people are short!)

Actors in food security policy areasThe FS policy arena is populated by various

government ministries, departments and agencies and other stakeholders including CSOs and NGOs, donors and producer associations.

Some actors have diametrically opposed policy interests in the FS agenda leading to policy battles.

Similarly, there are normative and ideological differences over approaches and strategies for achieving FS within the donor community and among various CSOs and NGOs working on agricultural development and food security.

Actors cont’dThis translates into lack of clarity on policy

goals, duplication of efforts and resources and sometimes, divergent if not diametrically opposed strategies for achieving FS.

There is need for a more institutionalised and inclusive mechanism for settling food security policy questions beyond the FS Joint Task Force

The ASWAP provides a useful entry point for such an inclusive policy platform for FS.

Smallholder farmers produce up to 90% of the maize but face serious land constraints.

On average there are 2.3 rural people per hactare of agricultural land compared to 0.4 people per hectare for all sub Saharan Africa

Land constraint is particularly severe in the Southern region where around 75% of households, each cultivates two acres (0.8 ha) or less.

A recent study shows that an increase of 0.25ha per capita of cultivated land would decrease the likelihood of food insecurity by 22% in the north, 24% in the centre and 27% in the south

Critical issues: Land reform

Land Cont’dBesides interventions to increase food yield per

unit of land, land redistribution is an important reform for food security especially when it is on record that about 25% of agricultural land owned by estates lies idle.

A study on land alienation within the GBI shows land transfers and changes in land use have potential to undermine the food security agenda

The GBI lacks operational guidelines on land use for investors in order to balance between food and non food crops and on exportation of food especially in times of food availability decline.

Land cont’dLand reforms are well over due despite the

existence of a land policyThere is need to negotiate a sustainable

political settlement over customary land to deal with questions of ownership and tenure in a manner that encourages investment in the land and guarantees social justice and agro-based rural livelihoods.

Input programmesInput programmes have their own share of

problems and inefficiencies but have been a tremendous success in achieving food security under President Bingu wa MutharikaNew York Times applauded Malawi for “ending

famine [by] simply ignoring experts”. The Guardian (UK) argued that “Africa’s green

revolution may be several steps nearer after a pioneering experiment in seed and fertiliser subsidies to small farmers”

UN observed that “in a few short years Malawi has come from famine to feast: from food deficit to surplus; from food importing country to food exporting country”

Input programmeThe FS success of the input programmes is that they

increase supply of maize and simultaneously reduce demand, keeping prices low during the hunger period.

Successful Input programmes remove the need for SGRs to hold large amounts of buffer stocks. Achieving FS by SGRs is expensive as it involves procuring, storing and distribution for free or at subsidised prices large amounts of maize. SGRs are also susceptible to mismanagement and corruption.

A key long term policy issue is whether continuation of input programmes should go alongside construction of new silos in some parts of the country?

Input prog cont’dThere is lack of clarity on whether the input

programmes are for enhancing agricultural productivity or for social protection. This is because of the targeting criteria for

beneficiaries as well as a lack of the notion of graduating beneficiaries from the programme

However, input programmes are prone to fraud and corruption at different levels:

The vagueness of targeting criteria makes accounting for the vouchers and the inputs difficult

There are disparities between NSO and MoAI about the population of farming families in rural Malawi. No sense of urgency to reconcile despite independent census of farming families in rural Malawi has been carried out.

This allows vested interested to manipulate the implementation of the programmes and carve out benefits/spoils mostly for political patronage.

Concerns about the awarding of contracts and tenders for input programmes. A recent assessment found that competitive

tendering and award rules are not always adhered to for both the inputs and transport: award quantities kept changing between evaluation

and contract signature; some bidders lost out completely without clear

reasons; some bidders who were disqualified at evaluation

stage were actually awarded contracts etc.

ADMARC & NFRA Ensuring food security means recognising the need for access to food in

local markets at affordable prices. A recent study has shown that food insecurity increases with increasing

distance from a weakly market in the northern region, and with increasing distance from an ADMARC depot in the central region.

It further shows that improving market access has potential to reduce food insecurity by 18 percent in the central region and 19 percent in the southern region

The role of ADMARC in providing agricultural markets is well documented and its political significance is recognised.

ADMARC and NFRAADMARC’s price smoothing has been less than

optimal. It has continued to be an arena of political patronage, a source of corruption reflected in reports of opaque maize transactions and sometimes a disincentive to private sector. ADMARC has a role in the food security agenda but its role needs to be streamlined.

The institutional relations between NFRA and ADMARC, vis-a-vis food security need rethinking and streamlining. For instance while the NFRA is responsible for managing grain reserves, ADMARC is responsible for setting grain prices.

ADMARC & NFRA Cont’dIt is not clear in the current FS policy milieu

whether the objective for SGRs is for price stabilisation or just a buffer stock to be released as welfare intervention in lean times to chronically food insecure households.

Donors and the food security agendaThe ideological differences and normative policy inclinations of

the various international development partners involved in the food security agenda are well known

This obviously puts government in a difficult position in terms of how to reconcile the conflicting world views while still being inclusive and accommodative

In practice a by-product of this is that the food security agenda has been projectised. One recent count identified 192 food security projects being implemented by different government departments and agencies and nongovernmental organisations and financed by various donors

the approach affects policy coherence at central government level and there is yet to develop an institutionalised mechanism for harnessing lessons from all the projects to feed into a more coherent and robust policy

Donors cont’dThe key issue here is that Government needs to

continue being assertive (demonstrated with FISP) to reclaim its legitimate policy space.

On their part, donors need to become more pragmatic and conform to the principles of the Paris Declaration and Accra Agenda for Action on Aid Effectiveness.

Donors need to be more aware that achieving FS in Malawi has become a profoundly political issue. Thus in addition to technical arguments about effectiveness and efficiency, their approaches must continuously be informed by solid political economy analysis to avoid rupturing a fragile state in a fragile society.

conclusionFS continues to be equated to national self-sufficiency in

maize productionThe food security agenda is affected by policy incoherence

and ideological differences among actors and stakeholders In order to sustain food security and maximise efficiency

gains, the paper calls for expedited land reforms and a rethink of land transfers and land use under the GBI, a rethink of the roles of ADMARC and NFRA and more clarity on the policy goals of the FISP.

While the role of donors in the food security agenda is recognised, this paper calls for donors to cede policy space to the government as food security has become a politically charged public policy problem in Malawi.