The Middle East and North Africa region is arguably the most politically volatile and food insecure area on earth. The sum of civil disruption and endemic food-security constraints has reduced many MENA nations to the equivalent of small, import-dependent countries, regardless of population....

Recent periods of high and volatile food prices have prompted several import-dependent Arab micro-states to consider at least some domestic production, among other proposals, as a way of mitigating extremely volatile food prices, which even in rich micro-states can have adverse health and...