The art of balancing food security: securing availability and affordability of food in Tanzania
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Date
2013-04
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Abstract
Monitoring of the UN Millennium Development
Goals (MDGs) indicates that a large number of countries are
not on track to reach the hunger targets set out in Goal 1
(MDG1, Eradicate Extreme Poverty and Hunger by 2015).
The purpose of this paper is to assess the appropriateness of
three underlying factors identified by the United Nations
Development Programme (UNDP), misguided policies, fail-
ing markets and weak institutions, in explaining food insecu-
rity in Tanzania. Our analysis basically supports UNDP’s
emphasis on the importance of policy, institutions and market
access when seeking to improve food security and reach
MDG1, but underlining the importance of empowering people
to hold the Government accountable for failing to deliver on
their policies and plans. The main finding is that the Tanzanian
Government is struggling with the difficulty of addressing the
twin goals of balancing national food availability with afford-
able food prices for urban and rural consumers.
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Keywords
Food security, Food policy, Tanzania, Food availability, Affordability