Table Of ContentFOOD SECURITY, FOOD PRICES AND
CLIMATE VARIABILITY
The agriculture system is under pressure to increase production every year as global popula-
tion expands and more people move from a diet mostly made up of grains, to one with more
meat, dairy and processed foods. This book uses a decade of primary research to examine how
weather and climate, as measured by variations in the growing season using satellite remote
sensing, has affected agricultural production, food prices and access to food in food- insecure
regions of the world.
The author reviews environmental, economic and multidisciplinary research to describe
the connection between global environmental change, changing weather conditions and local
staple food price variability. The context of the analysis is the humanitarian aid community,
using the guidance of the USAID Famine Early Warning Systems Network and the United
Nations World Food Programme in their response to food security crises. These organiza-
tions have worked over the past three decades to provide baseline information on food pro-
duction through satellite remote sensing data and agricultural yield models, as well as
assessments of food access through a food price database. These datasets are used to describe
the connection and to demonstrate the importance of these metrics in overall outcomes in
food- insecure communities.
Molly E. Brown is a research scientist at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center based in
Maryland, USA. She has a BS in Biology, and an MA and PhD in Geography. Her research
interests include understanding the effect of environmental variability on food prices and
market functioning, and the use of satellite remote sensing for decision- making.
OThER BOOkS IN ThE EARThSCAN FOOD AND
AgRICULTURE SERIES
Food Systems Failure
The global food crisis and the future of agriculture
Edited by Chris Rosin, Paul Stock and Hugh Campbell
Understanding the Common Agricultural Policy
Berkeley Hill
The Sociology of Food and Agriculture
Michael Carolan
Competition and Efficiency in International Food Supply Chains
Improving food security
John Williams
Organic Agriculture for Sustainable Livelihoods
Edited by Niels Halberg and Adrian Muller
The Politics of Land and Food Scarcity
Paolo De Castro, Felice Adinolfi, Fabian Capitanio, Salvatore Di Falco and Angelo Di Mambro
Principles of Sustainable Aquaculture
Promoting social, economic and environmental resilience
Stuart Bunting
Reclaiming Food Security
Michael S. Carolan
Food Policy in the United States
An introduction
Parke Wilde
Precision Agriculture for Sustainability and Environmental Protection
Edited by Margaret A. Oliver, Thomas F.A. Bishop and Ben P. Marchant
Agricultural Supply Chains and the Management of Price Risk
John Williams
The Neoliberal Regime in the Agri- Food Sector
Crisis, resilience and restructuring
Edited by Steven Wolf and Alessandro Bonanno
Sustainable Food Systems
Building a new paradigm
Edited by Terry Marsden and Adrian Morley
Seasonal Workers in Mediterranean Agriculture
The social costs of eating fresh
Edited by Jörg Gertel and Sarah Ruth Sippel
Food Security, Food Prices and Climate Variability
Molly E. Brown
For further details please visit the series page on the Routledge website: www.routledge.
com/books/series/ECEFA/
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FOOD SECURITY, FOOD
PRICES AND CLIMATE
VARIABILITY
Molly E. Brown
First published 2014
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2014 United States Government as represented by the Administrator of the National
Aeronautics and Space Administration. No copyright is claimed in the United States
under Title 17, U.S. Code. All Other Rights Reserved.
The right of Molly E. Brown to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by
her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act
1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in
any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter
invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or
retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered
trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to
infringe.
British Library Cataloguing- in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging- in-Publication Data
Brown, Molly E.
Food security, food prices and climate variability/Molly E. Brown.
pages cm. – (Earthscan food and agriculture)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Food security. 2. Food prices. 3. Climatic changes. 4. Agricultural productivity–
Environmental aspects. I. Title.
HD9000.5.B733 2014
338.1'9–dc23 2013044025
ISBN: 978-0-415-66311-3 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-0-415-66312-0 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-0-203-07168-7 (ebk)
Typeset in Bembo
by Wearset Ltd, Boldon, Tyne and Wear
CONTENTS
List of figures viii
List of tables xi
Acknowledgments xii
List of abbreviations xiii
1 Food security, food prices and climate variability 1
2 Food security and monitoring systems 23
3 Climate variability, agriculture and remote sensing 49
4 Trends in national food security and the impact of climate 69
5 Markets and determinants of food prices 91
6 Food prices and seasonality 114
7 Modeling the impact of climate variability on local food prices 132
8 Environmental and nutrition outcomes 156
9 Policy implications of price dynamics and the way forward 176
Index 196
FIgURES
1.1 Average monthly millet prices per 100 kg millet and average monthly income
in 1993 dollars in Burkina Faso 6
1.2 Average total household expenditures and percent of expenditures spent on
food for seven select countries 9
1.3 Regional food price indices, with the base year of 2005–06 set to 100 10
1.4 Multi- sectoral, thematic areas and activities that lead to analysis and improved
food security outcomes in Tanzania 12
2.1 Food security is made up of the utilization, availability and access to food,
which can be assessed at the individual, area and community levels of analysis 24
2.2 Conceptual framework that links climate variability and anthropogenic drivers
to their consequences on food production to food prices 27
2.3 Expenditures in Somaliland shillings of poor and very poor households in
Somalia in a normal year 29
2.4 National seasonal monitoring calendar for Niger 37
2.5 Average monthly price in CFA per kilogram of millet in Niger from 2002 to
2012 38
3.1 Global temperature index anomaly with base years 1951–80, showing large
increases in global temperature over the past century 53
3.2 The ten- day (dekadal) rainfall from NOAA’s Rainfall Estimate in 2011, 2012
and for the short- term or five- year mean for Ethiopia’s Southern Nations,
Nationalities and Peoples’ state 57
3.3 The NDVI uses the red and near- infrared portions of the spectrum,
maximizing the difference between the absorption in the 600–700 nm portion
and the reflectance in the 800–1,000 nm of the spectrum of healthy vegetation 58
3.4 Monthly NDVI time series plots from Niamey, Niger and Mogadishu,
Somalia, showing data from the AVHRR and MODIS sensors 59
3.5 Phenology metrics derived from models using NDVI temporal curves 63
4.1 Gross per capita agricultural production indices from the UN FAO’s statistical
database, 1960–2010 74
Figures ix
4.2 Value added agriculture as a percent of GDP for all countries, average of
2000–10 data 75
4.3 GNI per capita based on purchasing power parity plotted against percent of
the GDP in agriculture for the year 2010 76
4.4 Trends in area harvested in maize, millet, sorghum and miscellaneous grains
for the Africa region from 1961 to 2010 77
4.5 Scatter plot showing the relationship between cropped area and total harvested
area for maize in Africa, Asia, Europe and North America from 1961–2010 78
4.6 The growing agricultural capacity gap 84
4.7 Comparison of Food Balance Index model output with observed quantities of
the numbers of undernourished in each region provided by the FAO from
1979 to 2003 85
4.8 Food Balance Model projections 85
4.9 Map of global yields in kg/hectare shown by region 86
5.1 International corn future prices and US corn production from 1969–2010 93
5.2 Conceptual framework of the determinants of food, nutrition and health
security 95
5.3 Global yield increases for maize (corn) that shows that Africa and Central
America have not managed to gain from the global transformation of maize
productive capacity 98
5.4 International commodity prices at major ports for maize, rice and wheat 99
5.5 FAO’s food price indices, including food, cereals, sugar, oil, meat and dairy 103
5.6 Plot showing the retail price of sorghum, a locally grown small grain in
Zinder, Niger in CFA franc per kilogram, along with the cereals price index,
base 2004–06 104
6.1 Seasonal price dynamics from 1990 to 2012 in Zinder, Niger for retail
sorghum, a widely grown coarse grain 119
6.2 Averaged monthly millet prices and NDVI from Burkina Faso, Mali and
Niger 1982–2007 121
6.3 Conceptual diagram showing the impact of the interannual and seasonal
weather effects on food prices in small and isolated market systems 122
6.4 Distribution of millet prices in all markets during above average, average and
below average growing years, as measured by vegetation index 124
7.1 Local supply shocks do not determine equilibrium of local prices in a food
deficit market 138
7.2 Local supply shocks determine equilibrium local prices in an isolated food
surplus market 139
7.3 Local supply shocks partially determine equilibrium local prices in a connected
food surplus market 139
7.4 Seasonal and Markov price components and NDVI anomaly for Nairobi, Kenya 141
7.5 Summary of methods for price–NDVI model 142
8.1 Schematic describing the relationships between environmental conditions and
negative health outcomes, and the insulating effects of culture and society 158
8.2 Percent of children under five years who are stunted in 2011 by region 160
8.3 Monthly trends of global acute malnutrition prevalence in northern Bahr el
Ghazal state, South Sudan 167
