Food security at risk, says study

ROME: International trade in food relied on a small number of key ports, straits and roads, which faced increasing risks of disruption because of climate change, a report said today.

Disruptions caused by weather, conflict or politics at one of those so-called “chokepoints” could limit food supplies and push up prices, the study by British think-tank Chatham House warned.

“The risks are growing as we all trade more with each other and as climate change takes hold,” Laura Wellesley, one of the study’s authors, said.

Almost 25% of all food eaten around the world was traded on international markets, the report said.

The amount of maize, wheat, rice and soybean moved across the world each year is enough to feed about 2.8 million people and more than half passes through at least one of 14 inland routes, ports, and straits, such as the Panama and Suez canals.

About 20% of global wheat exports, for example, transit via the Turkish Straits, while more than 25% of soybean exports is shipped across the Straits of Malacca.

But infrastructure at these junctures was often old and ill-suited to cope with natural disasters, said Wellesley.

Roads in Brazil, the world’s largest exporter of soy bean, for instance, were exposed to the risk of flooding and landslides caused by heavy rains, she said.

That posed risks for the food security of importing countries and the economies of those exporting food, she added.

The report called on governments to invest in “climate-resilient” infrastructure as well as taking other precautionary measures such as diversifying food production and stocks. – Thomson Reuters Foundation