Who is food policy for?

Who is food policy for? VECO Indonesia posed this plain question to farmers during discussion of the complexity of the food problems facing the world's poor. Food is a problem only for the poor, because those who have money can buy and manufacture food that only they can enjoy, while we poor people could never afford it. This was repeatedly stated by 60 farmers (25 women) from Surenoho, Lebobele and Illepadung villages in Flores Timur district and from Worowaru village in Ende district, Nusa Tenggara Timur province.

This question is one of the key repsonses from small farmers to the current food crisis. We, VECO Indonesia, wanted to find out the views of small producer farmers on food availability in their villages, how they are responding, and to what extent the agriculture production systems they manage are adapting to the food crisis, particularly since the price of fuel oil was increased by the government last month. These informal discussions and visits to farmers' gardens took place on 15-24 June 2008.
 

Three key questions were asked during the discussions:
1. How are you responding to the food crisis?
2. Has food availability been affected by the rise in the price of fuel oil?
3. To what extent does the farming that you do contribute to your family's food availability? What kind of farming do you do?

In the paper that you can download below, you can read the anwers. Also two case studies on organic rice in Boyolali District and farmer cashew producers in Flores Timur District are presented.  These are concrete evidences that incentives and policy support help smallholders’ producers to develop sustainable food production and their livelihood. So, this paper consists of (1) introduction (2) an overview of food crisis (3) farmers’ response on food crises: The food crisis in the eyes of the farmers (4) learning from experience: sustainable farming a champion to overcome food crises and poverty sustainably, and conclusion (5).

Download the paper - PDF