Food Security Threats for the World and Iran

 Ensuring food security is one of the main pillars of sustainable development and combating it should be considered as one of the major goals of a country’s economic and social development plans. This study aimed to review the current threats to food security in Iran and globally.

 This study is a review article based on reviewing scientific literature about food security and food and nutrition policy through reviewing resources available in internal and foreign databases using appropriate keywords ‘food security’, ‘Iran’, ‘world’, ‘food insecurity’, and ‘challenges’.

 The coronavirus 2019 epidemic, climate change, drought and water scarcity, food loss and waste, hot and cold wars and conflicts (types of sanctions), economic crises, and the global increase in food prices all increase the risk of food insecurity worldwide, especially in low-income countries. The government’s economic and supportive policies can directly affect the food basket of low-income households, needed to meet physiological and nutritional needs. Subsidies and government food aid programs can strongly affect food security. It is important to allocate subsidies to vulnerable groups; however, it should be targeted to meet the basic needs of low-income groups.

 In recent years, when the toughest sanctions were imposed on Iran, the Supreme Leader of Iran emphasized on paying attention to “resistance economy”. A resilient economy approach should be taken to ensure national food security through creating sustainable food and nutrition system with the cooperation of all development sectors, and more effective cooperation of the capacity of the Supreme Council of Health and Food Security. In this regard, environmental factors such as domestic water and soil capacities, reducing food loss, waste, and promotion of the production and consumption of local and traditional food, as well as supporting rural agriculture should be taken into consideration.