Global food supply chains are complex and fragile, facing increasing pressures from war, natural disasters and climate change. Here, Professor Chris Elliott highlights how a recent WFP conference in Kenya highlighted the urgent need for a coalition to improve logistics, transparency and food safety in humanitarian response.
Professor Chris Elliott
Over the years, I have studied and participated in a variety of projects related to the global food supply chain. In nearly every case I have been involved with, the supply chain was highly complex and had weak points that could lead to food safety issues, fraud issues, or both.
It also shows that there are far more stressors than before, bringing resilience issues to the surface and leading to supply disruptions. But my first exposure to some of the difficulties, complexities and problems associated with humanitarian supply chains was when I was asked to provide scientific support for an incident a few years ago in which hundreds of food aid recipients fell ill and five died.1 The food was being supplied by the World Food Programme (WFP), an incredible organization that provides humanitarian aid to millions of people who suffer from severe food insecurity every year.2
Just recently, WFP convened a multidisciplinary group of experts from organizations including FAO, UNIDO, USAID, government food safety authorities, academia, and the private sector in Mombasa, Kenya to discuss the growing issues related to humanitarian food assistance and its distribution. I was one of the attendees at the meeting and learned a lot about the increasing pressures on the humanitarian sector in terms of growing challenges posed by war, natural disasters, and climate change. I also learned a lot about the incredible complexities and challenges of keeping supply chains functioning. Apart from all the issues I outlined, it seems to me that there are too many additional prohibitive restrictions, inconsistent guidelines, and standards that affect all humanitarian food agencies that deliver critical supplies to where they are needed most.
We visited the WFP warehouse in Mombasa to see first-hand how aid supplies are stored and distributed across 14 East African countries, some of which are still fighting wars within and outside their borders. We were amazed at the size and organization of the warehouse, but also at how little supplies remained compared to a few years ago. The concern of warehouse staff about the growing demand for supplies and dwindling stocks was clear.
There is a strong consensus among workshop participants that while there are increasing numbers of severely food insecure citizens in many parts of the world and trying to provide food aid to them poses numerous growing challenges, they are solvable. What we agreed on is that there is an urgent need to form a coalition of stakeholders; a group of thought leaders who can co-design a system that provides deeper understanding, greater transparency, improved data sharing, and facilitates significant improvements in logistics along many humanitarian supply chains. All workshop participants emphasized the importance of food safety in all aspects of the humanitarian food system, and were wholeheartedly committed to creating a working group to advance and implement the roadmap created during the event. While the topics discussed were incredibly serious, the energy and optimism of the workshop participants made it a great experience, and I am very proud to be part of this group that will bring much-needed new thinking and action in the future.
The next time you see a truck delivering desperately needed food aid on your television screen, take a moment to think about how that truck actually got there to deliver vital, nutritious and safe food to those in desperate need.
References
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2019/mar/21/un-to-explore-wave-of-deaths-linked-to-food-aid-porridge-in-uganda-world-food-programme https://www.wfp.org/stories/wfp-glance
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