Poverty, inequality and food security

Understanding how poverty, inequality and food security are interconnected is\r\nnecessary for actually providing adequate access to “sufficient food, which is\r\nadequate both in quantity and quality which conforms with the beliefs, culture,\r\ntraditions, dietary habits and preferences of individuals in accordance with\r\nnational and international laws and obligations” – according to the definition\r\ngiven at the World Food Summit in 1996.\r\nAccess to good quality, appropriate nutrition is a more comprehensive objective\r\nthan providing a predefined level of calories intake, or even accessing specific\r\nsets of micronutrients. Human nutrition is a complex social activity, shaped\r\nby culture and tradition; as anthropologist have shown, traditional local food\r\nhabits developed over the centuries in such a way to combine all necessary\r\nnutrients from local production; while the simple adoption of a new staple\r\nfood coming from other regions of the world – irrespective of native traditional\r\nknowledge – may lead to severe forms of malnutrition (as it was the case\r\nfor some northern Italy valleys, where corn was adopted as staple food and\r\npellagra followed)