Sophia Kalantzakos
Global Distinguished Professor, Environmental Studies and Public Policy
NEW YORK UNIVERSITY ABU DHABI

Aromar Revi
Director
INDIAN INSTITUTE FOR HUMAN SETTLEMENTS

Daojiong Zha
Professor, School of International Studies
Institute of South-South Cooperation and Development
PEKING UNIVERSITY

The age-old challenge of food security used to be dominated by concisely-defined national and international policies for agriculture, hunger eradication, food distribution, and safety nets for emergencies. The older field is being reshaped in the 21st century with the convergence of climate change, biotechnology, geopolitics, and a political economy that contends with a dominance of multinational corporations. The new landscape demands more capacious frameworks for understanding food security—frameworks that simultaneously contend with local, national, and international measures; integrate environmental, animal, and human health; and bring into conversation the political economy of poverty eradication with climate change. Indeed, the Ukraine-Russia war vividly illustrates the need for more capacious frameworks for conceptualizing food security. The war has had a direct impact on food supplies and prices but also subsequently on debt and inflation worldwide, especially in the poorest countries.  

Panelists will take on the challenge of deliberating on frameworks for food security by discussing the state of global food security; China’s and India’s domestic food security policies; and the influence of China and India on global institutions such as the Food and Agricultural Organization.