Security
In the past, the denial of food deliveries has been used as a weapon in war. For example, during World War I the blockade of the central powers led to significant shortages of food. Likewise during both world wars, the German submarine blockade was intended to starve Britain into submission.
Food security is an important political issue as national leaders attempt to maintain control of sufficient food supplies for their nation. It can drive national policy, encourage the use of subsidies to stimulate farming, or even lead to conflict.
In 1974, the World Food Summit defined food security as:
- availability at all times of adequate world food supplies of basic foodstuffs to sustain a steady expansion of food consumption and to offset fluctuations in production and prices
Read more about this topic: Food Politics
Famous quotes containing the word security:
“The three great ends which a statesman ought to propose to himself in the government of a nation, are,—1. Security to possessors; 2. Facility to acquirers; and, 3. Hope to all.”
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834)
“There is something that Governments care for far more than human life, and that is the security of property, and so it is through property that we shall strike the enemy.... Be militant each in your own way.... I incite this meeting to rebellion.”
—Emmeline Pankhurst (1858–1928)
“In the long course of history, having people who understand your thought is much greater security than another submarine.”
—J. William Fulbright (b. 1905)