当前位置： 首页»科研成果» 2013 Historical trends of food self-sufficiency in Africa 栾一博、崔雪锋、Marion Ferrat

 

Yibo Luan & Xuefeng Cui ^* & Marion Ferrat

 

State Key Laboratory of Earth Surface Processes and Resource Ecology, College of Global Change and Earth System Science, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, People’s Republic of China

 

ABSTRACT

The majority of African countries are stricken by food shortages and undernourishment, with much of the population lacking reliable access to food supplies and basic dietary requirements. In this paper, we analyze past trends of food production and consumption in Africa, both for the continent as a whole and for 52 individual countries within it. Fluctuations in the self-sufficiency ratio (SSR) are used to characterize the stability of a country’s capacity to sustain its own population, and GDP per capita is taken as representative of national purchasing power. Our study shows that Africa’s food self-sufficiency is lower today than it was throughout the entire study period. This is probably a result of demographic expansion, leading to a greater increase in food demand than in food production. At the national level, a decrease in SSR mainly occurred in Northern and Southern Africa, and high SSR fluctuations (i.e. low stability) always appeared in conjunction with low SSR levels. Although “low SSR-low GDP” countries face the most serious food insecurity conditions, both “low SSR-high GDP” and “high SSR-low GDP” countries also need attention.

 

KEY WORDS: Africa, Self-sufficiency ratio, Fluctuation, GDP per capita

 

PUBLISHED IN: FOOD SECURITY, 2013, 5 (3): 393-405

 

PDF DOWNLOAD: http://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s12571-013-0260-1.pdf