Food Security and Sustainability in India

The problem of food security is de facto and global. While we look at the financial crisis we cannot ignore the almost forgotten food crisis. India has revolutionised its agriculture but there is the phenomenon of food mountains and lakes alongside poverty, malnutrition and ill-health. For an emerging economy of India food insecurity is both an immediate tragedy and a threat to long-term well-being. Eradicating hunger and ensuring higher quality foods is not going to be easy even as agriculture is affected by climate change. However, agriculture forms part of the solution to climate change also. While we expect ‘more’ from agriculture we also need to accept the fact that agriculture by itself is unlikely to be able to eradicate hunger completely. Alternative strategies need to be (re)searched and adopted, quickly and safely. People should be able to buy enough food, not necessarily that they become self-sufficient. Need for a new matrix of food economics is apparent. Security also means safety for the consumers and the environment, now and in the future. Questions of ecological fallout cannot be brushed aside in futuristic strategies for the country’s food security. Food security has implications also for people who are producers of food both at the farm and non-farm levels. Agriprenuers and all connected with the food, nutrition and heath sectors are vital actors in the field game. This paper tries to analyse the problem of food security from a multi-dimensional perspective with emphasis on the aspects of poverty and sustainability. Besides looking at the varied dimensions of food security, the paper also evaluates the present polices and possible options