COVID-19 & Food Systems Transformation

The Committee on Food Security (CFS) is holding a special session on ‘COVID-19 and its Impacts on Global Food Security and Nutrition’ on the 14th of October. Yet a coordinated international political response to COVID-19 impacts on food security is still awaited. The pandemic has shed light on the vulnerabilities and lack of resilience of failing food systems, especially those highly dependent on imports or exports. As Action Against Hunger put forward immediate impacts of COVID-19 on the humanitarian world, food security and human rights in its July report, we can now anticipate long term consequences, which will add 83 to 132 million to the already alarming number of 690 million hungry people. Impacts observed by Action Against Hunger missions (with examples of DRC and Pakistan in this brief) echo global observations made by the High Level Panel of Experts on food security and call for the same set of recommendations. States must engage now for a deep transformation of food systems to ensure the right to food for all as well as resilience towards the spread of this crisis, and the ones to come, in light of climate and biodiversity challenges. This engagement should be made within the framework of the CFS, the most inclusive and legitimate governance fora for food security matters.