World Food Policy Volume 2, Number 1, Spring 2015 | Page 94

The Negative Side of the Agricultural–Nutrition Impact Pathways: A Literature Review

Therefore, there is an urgent
need to develop conceptual framework,
methodologies, and operational tools to
think food system(s) as systems and not
only as separated food market chains
providing each certain kinds of “healthy
foods” (such as fortified single staple
food). The food systems should provide
all people (including poor and rich) at
all time with many different kinds of
affordable food products. Food systems
do not only encompass producers and
markets but the whole realm of eating and
food practices, including provisioning,
cuisine, cooking and recipes, places and
different “table manners”, companionship, … (see Poulain, 2002). These
multiple knowledge and know-how,
which are gendered are invisible, while
women are the very cornerstone of
food security. We believe that precise
theoretical and applied research in those
areas are lacking and would be most
fruitful. It will nourish new conception
of agricultural policies and interventions
where people, especially women, would
be seen as both beneficiaries and actors
with real agency.

It is thus important to update
explicit empirical studies on linkages
between agriculture and nutrition. It
was not possible to identify any recent
empirical work directly showing negative
impacts on nutrition. Intermediate
variables were used (income, status of
women, food diversity, health, etc.),
but the full impact pathways have not
been developed. The few recent studies
of this type tend to concentrate on
localized projects and on positive effects,
particularly of small-scale livestock
farming or family gardens. It is therefore
necessary to (i) reposition the question

of the links between agriculture and
nutrition in the current context, taking
into account the different forms of
agriculture (see Wiggins and Keats
2013), the double malnutrition burden
(excess weight and undernutrition), the
lengthening of the supply chains (see
Hawkes and Ruel 2012), the role played
by private processing and distribution
macro-stakeholders, etc., and (ii) extend
deliberations to the scale of agricultural
and food policies.

References
AFD Agence Française de Développement.
2013. Sécurité alimentaire en Afrique
subsaharienne. Cadre d’intervention
Sectoriel 2013–2016: 80pp.
Ansoms, An. 2013. "Large-Scale Land
Deals and Local Livelihoods in Rwanda:
The Bitter Fruit of a New Agrarian Model."
African Studies Review 56 (3): 1-23.
Arimond, Mary, Corinna Hawkes, Marie
Ruel, Zeina Sifri, Peter R. Berti, Jef L.
Leroy, Jan W Low, Lynn R Brown, and
Edward A. Frongillo. 2011. “Agricultural
Interventions and Nutrition: Lessons
from the Past and New Evidence”. In
Combating Micronutrient Deficiencies:
Food-Based Approaches, edited by Brian
Thompson and Leslie Amoroso. , 41-75.
Rome, Italy & Oxfordshire & Cambridge,
UK: FAO & CABI.
Bain, Carmen. 2010. "Structuring the
Flexible and Feminized Labor Market:
GlobalGAP Standards for Agricultural
Labor in Chile." Signs: Journal of Women
in Culture and Society 35 (2):343-367.
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