Sustainable Social Development as a Path to Food Security in the Caribbean

Introduction

The Caribbean, a region of Small Island Developing States (SIDS) and densely forested coastal countries, faces unique development challenges despite its natural beauty. The region’s distinct geography creates natural obstacles to economic development in terms of distance, transportation, available land, scale, and integration. Additionally, the Caribbean’s colonial legacy continues to exert social, economic, and political effects.

Food insecurity is of particular concern in the Caribbean, exacerbated by the rising food import bill and its effects on national accounts, an overwhelming reliance on imported food, a struggling agriculture sector, and declines in nutrition and health outcomes. To address this challenge, the Caribbean Development Bank^[1] and similar organizations must understand the nexus between local agricultural industries and people’s livelihoods, cultural identities, and economic strength. Achieving food and nutrition security means addressing well-being and quality of life, building more inclusive and sustainable economies, expanding local agricultural production, and supporting climate mitigation and adaptation projects.

Food Security

The fragility of food security in the Caribbean stems from unique and intertwined constraints. Most food consumed in the region is imported either raw or semi-processed for subsequent processing. This leaves Caribbean consumers and industry vulnerable to natural disasters or conflicts that break out in Asia, Europe, or Africa.^[2] The effects of this vulnerability compound with every new crisis. Indeed, the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine have further undermined food access, availability, and affordability.^[3]

In 2021, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimated that 68 percent of people in the Caribbean faced moderate or severe food insecurity between 2018 and 2020.^[4] A more recent survey estimated that 4.1 million people in the English and Dutch-speaking Caribbean faced moderate or severe food insecurity, an increase of 1.3 million between February and August 2022.^[5] The region registered a small improvement in May 2023, when only 3.7 million, or 51 percent of the population, reported moderate or severe food insecurity.^[6] However, food insecurity has entered a new and more troubling phase, with half of the regional population experiencing moderate to severe food insecurity on a year-to-year basis.

Food Production

The profile of food production in the Caribbean stands out from other regions due to the concentration of production and the dominance of smallholder farmers in agriculture.^[7] About 89.5 percent of smallholder farmers operate on less than 5 acres, collectively accounting for 55 percent of cultivated land in the region.^[8] On the other hand, for example, the average Canadian farm is 809 acres, with 9,120 farms operating on 3,520 or more acres.^[9]

Challenges such as limited productivity, lack of access to finance, and insufficient infrastructure hinder smallholders. Compared to more consolidated holdings, these farmers face inefficiencies, high post-harvest losses, lower-quality products, and limited access to high-value markets.^[10] Climate change exacerbates these difficulties in the form of more frequent and longer droughts, extreme weather events, changes in precipitation patterns, and interrupted harvests. Despite these concerns, smallholder farms remain pivotal for food security. The cultivation of fresh fruits, vegetables, and root crops, along with the rearing of poultry and small livestock, provides rich nutritional sources for rural household consumption. Households that engage in small-scale farming can also redirect their earnings toward non-food items, utilities, school supplies, and medical bills. Thus, small-scale agriculture provides an essential lifeline for many families in the region.^[11]

The relative availability of water across Caribbean countries constitutes a key compounding constraint. For instance, Antigua and Barbuda have approximately 600 cubic meters of renewable freshwater resources per inhabitant per year, while Guyana has over 350,000 cubic meters of renewable freshwater resources per inhabitant per year.^[12] Therefore, food security through import substitution is not viable in every country since many islands have limited freshwater resources. Any regional approach toward sustainable and resilient agricultural development in the Caribbean must therefore consider national differences in water endowments, production potential, efficiency, and management.^[13]

Import Reliance 

Soaring import costs threaten every Caribbean economy. Imports amount to between 80 and 90 percent of all food consumed in the CARICOM region, with only three countries (Guyana, Belize, and Haiti) producing more than 50 percent of their own food.^[14] The annual food import bill amounted to approximately $5 billion in 2020.^[15] Before the pandemic, the "collective food import bill in the region was $3 billion in 2016, $5 billion in 2018, and $ 4.78 billion in 2019."^[16] This marks an increase from $2.08 billion in 2000 and $3 billion in 2012.^[17]

Most food is sourced from or through the US, which places tremendous pressure on Caribbean countries’ foreign reserves and causes them to lose funds on foreign exchange transactions. This hinders investment in domestic agriculture and limits economic growth, leaving the region vulnerable to worldwide fluctuations in production, prices, and supply. Furthermore, the expansion of local production and consumption of cultural foods—in contrast to the heavily processed imported foods that have broken into local diets since the 1980s—is a necessary precondition to establishing food and nutrition security in the Caribbean. Thus, localized, culture-aligned initiatives represent the most direct path to increasing both lifespans and well-being in the region.

Social Consequences

The unaffordability of food exacerbates food insecurity at the national and individual levels. For example, from April 2022 to April 2023, the cost of food increased by 66 percent in Suriname, 17 percent in Trinidad and Tobago, almost 15 percent in Belize, and 10 percent in Jamaica.^[18] These increases followed a rise in food prices by 5 percent every month in Guyana, Haiti, and Suriname between March 2021 and March 2022.^[19]

Figure 1: Food inflation in the Caribbean (an increase in the cost of food in April 2023 over the same month in the previous year)

Source: Trading Economics

The social consequences of runaway food inflation resonate in terms of availability, access, and affordability, and persist within vulnerable segments of the population. In particular, "[w]omen, especially in rural areas…are more likely to experience food insecurity."^[20] Additionally, large, women-led families bear the worst outcomes, while lower levels of education, social capital, and GDP per capita are also associated with high likelihoods of experiencing food insecurity.^[21]

Figure 2: Unaffordability of healthy diets in Latin America and the Caribbean, 2020

Source: FAO, IFAD, UNICEF, WFP and WHO. 2022. The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2022. Repurposing food and agricultural policies to make healthy diets more affordable. Rome, FAO. 

In addition to the rising cost of food in general, a healthy diet has become increasingly unaffordable. In 2020, FAO estimated that 52 percent of the Caribbean population was unable to afford a healthy diet, with the most pronounced rates in Haiti, Jamaica, and Suriname.^[22] The rates in these countries exceed the world average of 42 percent and the South American average of 18 percent.^[23] Food insecurity, and especially the unaffordability of a healthy diet, is associated with increased hunger, anemia among women, and stunted growth among children.^[24] These factors strain local healthcare resources and deepen socio-economic hardship. The consequences of food insecurity for families and individuals could last generations.

Climate Change 

Caribbean SIDS, and the region in general, are most vulnerable to climate change. This can be traced on two axes: natural disasters and environmental transformation. For example, in 2017, Hurricane Maria caused economic damage in Dominica equivalent to between 225 percent and 253 percent of its GDP.^[25] The hurricane happened just two years after Tropical Storm Erika caused damage equivalent to 92 percent of the island’s GDP.^[26] Natural disasters have emerged as an accelerating reality for Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Belize, Dominica, Jamaica, and St. Lucia, as each state’s probability of experiencing a hurricane landfall in a given year has climbed to 15 percent or higher.^[27]

Figure 3: Probability of a Hurricane Striking in a Given Year (in percent)

Source: EM-DAT; and IMF staff calculations

The impact of climate change on food security also proceeds through medium and long-term environmental transformation stemming from flooding, extended periods of drought, extreme heat, sea-level rise, and the destruction of arable land.^[28]

Climate change erodes food security by wiping out infrastructure, discouraging investment, and disrupting food production, supply, and transit. Tropical storms and hurricanes, through extreme winds and excess rainfall, already cause significant economic losses with shocking regularity, while annually 40 percent of the region is impacted by mild droughts and 10 percent by severe droughts. From this baseline, climate change damage in the Caribbean is projected to grow from 5 percent of GDP in 2025 to more than 20 percent of GDP by 2100, assuming no regional action is taken in the areas of mitigation or adaptation.^[29] All this has led United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to declare that "the Caribbean is ground zero for the global climate emergency."^[30] A regional response is indispensable.

Addressing Food Insecurity

Advancing food security in the Caribbean requires immediate action to "expand programs for vulnerable individuals, invest in the education and skills of the food insecure, expand gender-sensitive interventions, and allocate funds to expand social capital."^[31] Interventions that are designed, targeted, and implemented properly to tackle the social consequences of food insecurity form a virtuous cycle, reducing inequality and incidence of extreme poverty through inclusive and sustainable growth. The approach must also advance women’s position in agriculture, given that women suffer disproportionately from food insecurity and because women’s empowerment is positively associated with calorie availability and dietary diversity — for themselves and for their families.^[32]

Addressing food insecurity requires collaborative action. The Caribbean Development Bank’s most impactful food security interventions in Belize, Grenada, and Haiti have occurred in partnership with the International Fund for Agricultural Development, the Green Climate Fund, and Welthungerhilfe.^[33] A strengthened food security coalition necessitates leaning into regional and global networks to develop social partnerships with non-governmental organizations, civil society, rural communities, and local agri-business. In the international community, policymakers must also revisit and champion initiatives like the long-proposed International Food Security Treaty as a step toward an enforceable framework that builds on the 2004 Voluntary Guidelines to Support the Progressive Realization of the Right to Food in the Context of National Food Security.^[34]

Enhanced food production and trade across the Caribbean will benefit rural areas by creating better jobs in agriculture while improving food quality, affordability, and nutritiousness. In this way, lower-GDP-per-capita countries, which make up the lion’s share of the region’s population and agricultural workforce, stand to benefit the most from enhanced regional food security. Ensuring the right to food means supporting local food production and empowering communities through employment opportunities, enhanced nutrition, and more vibrant local economies. Consequently, commitment to building a bright, lasting Caribbean future means recognizing food security as the key issue.

Conclusion

States and international organizations like the Caribbean Development Bank have a duty to help vulnerable countries mitigate and adapt to climate change, secure the right to food, reduce poverty, and transform lives. This means using their platforms to champion the importance of the right to food, organizing interventions in meaningful partnership with stakeholder communities and smallholder farmers, and centering food security in project proposals, designs, appraisals, implementation, and monitoring.

Only a combined and sustained effort by such organizations will make it possible to feed the world’s growing population, transform the lives of rural and urban communities, and meet the overarching goal of reducing poverty and food insecurity. As the Caribbean demonstrates, food security is essential to delivering sustainable development for populations around the world. However, policymakers must avoid blanket approaches in favor of recognizing the unique characteristics of an area and its people. For the Caribbean to thrive, food security cannot remain an aspiration—it must be a lived reality.

Ms. Wilson Patrick is the General Counsel and Bank Secretary of the Caribbean Development Bank. She would like to extend appreciation to all those who assisted in any way with the production of this article. In particular, she would like to thank Matthew Daminato, Young Professional (Legal) at the Caribbean Development Bank, for his invaluable input and support with this article.

[1] The Caribbean Development Bank was established to contribute to the harmonious economic growth and development of the member countries in the Caribbean and to promote economic co-operation and integration among them, having special and urgent regard to the needs of the less developed members of the region. Its Borrowing Member Countries (BMCs) are Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Belize, British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Jamaica, Grenada, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Montserrat, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, The Bahamas, Trinidad and Tobago, and Turks and Caicos Islands. “Bank History.” Caribbean Development Bank. Accessed June 5, 2024. https://www.caribank.org/bank-history; “Borrowing Members.” Caribbean Development Bank. Accessed June 5, 2024. https://www.caribank.org/countries-and-members/borrowing-members.

[2] For a discussion of this phenomenon, see Marisa Wilson, “Food and nutrition security policies in the Caribbean: Challenging the corporate food regime?” Geoforum 73 (July 2016): 60, citing CARICOM and FAO. CARICOM Regional Food and Nutrition Security Action Plan (RFNSAP) 2012-2016. 2011, draft at para 1.1. 

[3] Food Security Information Network. Global Report on Food Crises 2023. Food Security Information Network, 2023.

[4] FAO, IFAD, PAHO, WFP and UNICEF. Latin America and the Caribbean – Regional Overview of Food Security and Nutrition 2021: Statistics and trends. Santiago: FAOx, 2021. https://doi.org/10.4060/cb7497en. ) FAO, IFAD, UNICEF. WFP and WHO. The state of food security and nutrition in the World. Rome: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, 2021, quoted in Mohammadi, et al, “Food Security Challenges and Options in the Caribbean: Insights from a Scoping Review” Anthropocene Science 1 no. 11 (January 2022): 92.

[5] Regional Summary Report, Caribbean Food Security & Livelihoods Survey – August 2022. World Food Programme, 2022, 4.  https://www.wfp.org/publications/caribbean-food-security-livelihoods-survey-august-2022.

[6] Ibid, 24. This calculation includes Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Aruba, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, The British Virgin Islands, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Montserrat, St. Kits and Nevis, St Lucia, St Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, Turks and Caicos.

[7] Regional Summary Report, Caribbean Food Security & Livelihoods Crisis – May 2023, World Food Programme, 2023, 6. https://docs.wfp.org/api/documents/WFP-0000150620/download/?_ga=2.62409772.1809462139.1691684131-750127207.1691684131. According to the World Food Programme, “By far the largest agricultural producers in the Caribbean are Guyana, Belize, and Jamaica, making up a total of 84% of all agricultural production in the region. The most common agricultural product in the region is sugar cane (49% of all agricultural production), followed by fruits (16%) and cereals (12%, largely rice).”

[8] Ronald Gordon and Edward Evans, "Rethinking Caribbean Food and Nutrition Security via Utilization of Local Foods," Farm & Business 11 no. 1 (2019): 19. Gordon and Evans rely on State of Food Insecurity in the CARICOM Caribbean – Meeting the 2015 Hunger Targets: Taking Stock of Uneven Progress. FAO, IFAD, and World Food Programme, 2015, 8.

[9] Canada Census of Agriculture 2021.

[10] Appraisal Report on the Belize Resilience Programme – B Resilient. Caribbean Development Bank (BD111/22) AR22/15 BZE, 1.01-1.03.

[11] Appraisal Report on the Climate Smart and Agriculture Rural Enterprise Programme. Caribbean Development Bank (BD 161/17) AR 17/15GR, 1.04.

[12] Jürgen Mahlknecht Mahlknecht, Ramón González-Bravo,  and Frank Loge, “Water-energy-food security: A Nexus perspective of the current situation in Latin America and the Caribbean” Energy 194 no. 116824 (March 2020): 5.

[13] See David Oscar Yawson, “Balancing water scarcity, food production, and trade imperatives in the Caribbean: Could virtual water supply analysis help?”  Journal of Cleaner Production 376 no. 132285 (2020). Yawson notes that “[t]he equivalent volume of water required to support full import substitution, at current yields and consumption, was larger than total internal renewable water resources for some countries.”

[14] See Dr. ‘Gene’ Leon Hyginus, “President Address to the Board of Governors of the Caribbean Development Bank at the 52^nd Annual General Meeting,” Caribbean Development Bank, June 15, 2022.

[15] Jeanelle Kelly, “St. Kitts and Nevis Positions Itself to Achieve CARICOM’s 25 by 2025 Agenda, Significantly Reduce its High Food Import Bill – CARICOM Today,” CARICOM, July 27, 2023.

[16]  Ibid.

[17] Nigel Durrant, Regional Food Production and Productivity Towards a Sustainable Import Replacement Programme: 25% by 2025 Reduction in the Regional Food Bill. CARICOM, 2022, 3; For the period 2018 – 2020, the top five (5) food importing countries in the region were: Haiti (USD 3.161 billion); Jamaica (USD1.2 billion); Trinidad and Tobago (USD 1.08 billion); Bahamas (USD 555.6 million) and Barbados (USD 407.6 million).

[18] Regional Summary Report, Caribbean Food Security & Livelihoods Crisis – May 2023, World Food Programme, 2023. https://docs.wfp.org/api/documents/WFP-0000150620/download/?_ga=2.62409772.1809462139.1691684131-750127207.1691684131> at6.

[19] World Bank Group. “Food Insecurity in the Caribbean.” World Bank, June 28, 2022. https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2022/06/28/food-insecurity-caribbean.

[20] Michael Smith, Woubet Kassa, and Paul Winters, “Assessing Food Insecurity in Latin America and the Caribbean using FAO’s Food Insecurity Experience Scale,” Food Policy 71 (August 2021), 17.

[21] Ibid, 22-23. 

[22] See Regional Overview of Food Security, 69; Caribbean multi-country strategic plan (2022-2026), World Food Programme, WFP/EB.1/2022/7-A/3, para 16.

[23] Regional Overview of Food Security, 69.

[24] Ibid, 77.

[25] “After the Rain: The Lasting Effects of Storms in the Caribbean.” UNDP. Accessed June 5, 2024. https://www.undp.org/latin-america/after-rain-lasting-effects-storms-caribbean.

[26] Ïbid.

[27] “Caribbean Small States: Challenges of High Debt and Low Growth.” International Monetary Fund, February 20, 2013, 6; Ýnci Ötker and Krishna Srinivasan, “Bracing for the Storm: For the Caribbean, building resilience is a matter of survival,” Finance & Development 0055, 001 (2018), A014, accessed Jun 5, 2024, https://doi.org/10.5089/9781484343418.022.A014; Mohammadi, “Food Security Challenges and Options in the Caribbean,” 96.

[28] “Climate Explainer: Food Security and Climate Change.” World Bank, October 19, 2022. https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2022/10/17/what-you-need-to-know-about-food-security-and-climate-change, citing William R. Sutton, et al., “Looking Beyond the Horizon: How Climate Change Impacts and Adaptation Responses Will Reshape Agriculture in Eastern Europe and Central Asia.” Directions in development: agriculture and rural development. Washington, DC: World Bank, 2013. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/13119.

[29] Adelle Thomas, et al., “Climate Change and Small Island Developing States,”  Annual Review of Environment and Resources 45 (2020): 8.

[30] “The Caribbean Is ‘ground Zero’ for the Global Climate Emergency: Guterres | UN News.” United Nations. July 3, 2022. https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/07/1121902.

[31] Regional Overview of Food Security, 23.

[32] Michael Smith, Woubet Kassa, and Paul Winters, “Assessing Food Insecurity in Latin America and the Caribbean using FAO’s Food Insecurity Experience Scale,” Food Policy 71, (2021):17.

[33] See Appraisal Report on the Belize Resilience Programme; Appraisal Report on the Climate Smart and Agriculture Rural Enterprise Programme. Caribbean Development Bank (BD 161/17) AR 17/15 GR; Appraisal Report on the Community-Based Agriculture and Rural Development II -  Haiti. Caribbean Development Bank (BD 112/20) AR 20/9 HAI.

[34] Schwartz, Madeleine. “John Teton Fights Hunger with the International Food Security Treaty Campaign.” Harvard Magazine, March 3, 2014. https://www.harvardmagazine.com/2011/04/hunger-fighter.