Faltering fisheries and ascendant aquaculture: Implications for food and nutrition security in Bangladesh

Bangladesh has made considerable progress against human development indicators in recent years, but malnutrition resulting from poor dietary diversity and low micronutrient intakes remains entrenched. Fish is central to the Bangladeshi diet and small fish species are an important micronutrient source. Although fish consumption per capita has increased in recent years as a result of rapid expansion of aquaculture, it is likely that consumption of fish from capture fisheries (including small indigenous species particularly rich in micronutrients), has declined. This paper evaluates data on fish consumption collected in Bangladesh by the International Food Policy Research Institute in 1996/7 and 2006/7 to assess changing patterns of fish consumption and their implications for food and nutrition security. This analysis indicates that growth of aquaculture has been positive, mitigating a sharp reduction in the quantity of fish consumed from capture fisheries and smoothing out seasonal variability in consumption. However, increased availability of fish from aquaculture may not have fully compensated for the loss of fish from capture fisheries in terms of dietary diversity, micronutrient intakes and food and nutrition security, particularly for the poorest consumers. A range of approaches are recommended to sustain and enhance the contributions capture fisheries and aquaculture make to food and nutrition security in Bangladesh     

Near cost-optimal inventory control policies for divergent networks under fill rate constraints

We deal with the optimisation of stock levels in general divergent networks under a periodic review, order-up-to ($\text{R,}\text{S}$) policy. The goal is to attain target fill rates, while the total holding costs in the entire network are minimised. To this end, we first present a method for the fast calculation of the control parameters, given central and intermediate stock levels. Next we develop an approximate procedure to determine stock levels sequentially. Extensive numerical experimentation shows that this procedure yields satisfactory results. It also shows that significant stocks at intermediate stockpoints are only useful if unit holding costs in these stockpoints are considerably less than in the end stockpoints that deliver directly to the final customers.     

Fish as food : Present contribution and potential

The author gives an account of the importance of fish as a source of animal protein and as an appreciated food, particularly in developing countries. Despite declining growth rates in food fish production in recent years, there is considerable potential for increasing supplies in order to maintain the role of fish. The relatively low cost of many fish-producing systems should encourage increased exploitation of fishery resources for food purposes. This will not be achieved, however, unless sustained efforts in research and development are ensured. Collaboration on an international scale and financial support from developed countries will be required.     

Footprints of water and energy inputs in food production – Global perspectives

During the second half of the 20th century the global food production more than doubled and thus responded to the doubling of world population. But the gains in food production came at a cost, leaving a significant environmental footprint on the ecosystem. Global cropland, plantations and pastures expanded, with large increases in fossil energy, water, and fertilizer inputs, imprinting considerable footprint on the environment. Information from pre eminent publications such as Nature, Science, PNAS and scholarly journals is synthesized to assess the water and energy footprints of global food production. The data show that the footprints are significant, both locally, national and globally and have consequences for global food security and ecosystem health and productivity. The literature nearly agrees that global food production system generates considerable environmental footprints and the situation would likely get worrisome, as global population grows by 50% by 2050. Investments are needed today to buffer the negative impacts of food production on the environment. Investments to boost water productivity and improve energy use efficiency in crop production are two pathways to reduce the environmental footprint.     

Reflections on food crises past

World food crises are relatively rare events, occurring roughly three times a century. But they also tend to be regular events, every three decades or so, suggesting there is an underlying cyclical cause. If so, far-sighted donor and government investments in raising agricultural productivity, and policies on behalf of stable food production and prices, might go a long way to preventing food crises in the future. Preventing food crises rather than trying to cope after the fact with their impact on the poor is the only way to avoid substantial, perhaps permanent, damage to the welfare of poor households. Lessons from the world food crises in 1972/73 and in 2007/08, especially lessons from how the world rice market functioned, point the way toward improved food policy management at national and international levels in the future.     

Energy systems analysis for food policy

Recent work on energy systems analysis of food production systems has demonstrated the importance of energy to the food production sector of the economy. We show how energy requirements for food production are closely related to the intensity of production, and that there is a quantifiable trade-off between land and energy use. This trade-off is quite different for vegetable and industrial food as opposed to animals and fish. Thus the energy consequences to food production from changes in diet, shrinking land resources or increasing population may be readily computed.     

The food crisis and environmental conservation in Africa

In spite of good rains in Africa in 1985, 30-35 million people suffered the effects of famine. Much of Africa is still dependent on food aid. The main causes of insufficient food production are land degradation--desertification--and high population growth. Distribution of the US $2.9 billion in food and non-food aid has been hampered by transport and logistical problems. The major challenge for 1986 is non-food support. Only US $460 million (15.3%) of non-food aid had been received as of March. Country profiles of Angola, Chad, Ethiopia, Mozambique, Somalia, Sudan, Lesotho, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Rwanda, Tanzania, and Zambia show a pattern of high food assistance needs and displaced refugee populations. The 1st 6 of the group suffer from civil strife. There is some good news; e.g. Niger, which is embarking on agressive agricultural development, and Tanzania, which has enjoyed bumper crops, but the crisis is clearly far from over. Few African Governments have been willing to face the population problem; population in the area will probably continue to increase at 3% yearly. It is shown that desertification: reducing the biological potential of the land through over-exploitation, animal husbandry, and deforestation, is a wordwide problem particularly acute in Africa. Lost production totals $26 billion annually. Straightforward cost-benefit analysis of projects to halt or reverse the problem does not adequately take factors such as human attachment to the land into account. Unfortunately halting desertification does not receive the attention it should receive from donor agencies. Investment goes towards high-return projects, e.g. power dams; sugar factories, when a more careful study reveals that returns from afforestations are much more long-term. There has been increased consciousness of the long-term benefits of dryland rehabilitation, which will hopefully impact policy in the future. But since desertification is a self-accelerating process, there is a need for very rapid action.     

Consumer knowledge and use of information about fish and aquaculture

This paper explores consumers’ knowledge about fish and aquaculture and assesses the use and importance of different information cues about fish. Cross-sectional data were collected in 2008 through a consumer survey (n = 3213) in the Czech Republic, Germany, Greece, Italy, Portugal, Romania, Sweden and the UK. Consumers’ knowledge about fish generally, and about aquaculture in particular, was relatively low and differed significantly between countries. Consumers from all countries reported an indication of quality and/or food safety as an information cue when buying fish. The information sources most frequently used by Europeans were labelling and sellers in retail or supermarkets. The Internet was identified by consumers in all of the countries as one of the most important sources of information about sea and freshwater fish products. Policy makers and food marketers are encouraged to develop a simple and easily recognisable mark (relating to quality, food safety and nutrition) to assist consumer decision-making. Information campaigns focusing on issues such as the nutritional benefits of eating fish are also recommended.     

Fish: Friend or foe? Food policy and subpopulation warnings for consumers

Fish is a healthy food that provides valuable nutrients for heart health and cognitive development. However, for some subpopulations, consuming fish containing higher levels of methylmercury may pose a health risk. This research seeks to identify the impact of including a seafood warning disclosure in the advertisement of a can of tuna fish on consumers’ purchasing behaviors. An experimental survey is employed to examine the resulting impact for two segments of the population – those considered at risk for methylmercury overexposure and all others. Findings indicate the use of warning disclosures increases respondents’ negative product perceptions without significantly altering positive product perceptions. Attention to the warning is short-lived and does not significantly impact perceived healthful levels of consumption. Modeling purchase behavior using a random utility choice framework indicates that the inclusion of a warning in an advertisement of a can of tuna fish has no adverse affect on purchase behaviors for the population not at-risk and may, in certain cases, serve to decrease tuna purchase likelihood for “at-risk” respondents. Communicating advisory statements on healthy products, such as fish, creates a public health challenge; message pre-testing is imperative.     

Integrating fisheries,food and nutrition – Insights from people and policies in Timor-Leste

The important role of fish in food and nutrition security is becoming more widely acknowledged by the fishery sector and within food policy. Integration of fish and food policy, at national, regional or global levels, is required to ensure the contribution of fisheries and aquaculture to human health is supported through governance arrangements. We explore this aspect of food policy integration in Timor-Leste, where malnutrition is a critical health problem. Consumption of fish is low by international standards and only a small proportion of the population engages in fishing. We used a mixed method approach involving desktop policy analysis, interviews and social network analysis to explore interactions among sectoral instruments and organisations. Our results show generally good integration of food security into fisheries policies, but a lack of integration of fish into food policies. Policy network analysis revealed evidence of collaboration and cooperation between sectors, however, consideration of fish and food concerns was not well embedded across all organisations. We discuss challenges and options for future integration of fisheries into sustainable food systems in Timor-Leste and more broadly, including the need for greater political will and resources, combined with clearer targets and actions within instruments.     

What will we eat tomorrow? UK food industry and its market

An OECD report on Food Marketing and Economics stated in 1970 that ‘the basic direction of development … is towards a food industry dominated by a limited number of large, efficient, dynamic, market oriented companies’. This is certainly so. In the UK from one to three companies already account for from 60 to 96% of the sales of a wide range of processed foods (biscuits, breakfast cereals, bread, frozen fish, frozen vegetables, ice cream, margarine, potato crisps, sugar, tea, tinned fruit and tinned soups). Out of £362 million spent on advertising in 1973, £88 million was spent on food, more than on any other product category. Undoubtedly the food industry is influencing to an increasing extent what people eat, and their nutrition. An extensive report on the status of the UK food industry and many of its sectors, British Food Profile¹, was released in 1978. The report is discussed below.     

Farm costs and food miles: An assessment of the full cost of the UK weekly food basket

Changes in both farm production and food transport have resulted in the imposition of new levels of environmental costs. This study analyses the full costs of foods in the average weekly UK food basket by calculating the costs arising at different stages from farms to consumers’ plates. Of the 12 commodities assessed, livestock produce contributes the most costs per kg. The external cost of UK agriculture up to the farm gate is estimated to be £1.51 bn yr⁻¹; it is calculated that a switch to organic production could lead to avoided costs of £1.13 bn yr⁻¹. Agricultural and food produce accounts for 28% of goods transported on UK roads, currently imposing estimated external costs of £2.35 bn yr⁻¹. The contribution made by sea and air transport is currently trivial owing to low volumes. However, road transport to carry food from the shop to home is estimated to impose a further £1.28 bn yr⁻¹ to total external costs. Subsidies not targeted at environmental improvements cost consumers £2.88 bn yr⁻¹. Thus the real cost of the per capita UK food basket (£24.79) is calculated to be £2.91 more per person wk⁻¹ (11.8%) if externalities and subsidies are included, with farm externalities (81 p), domestic road transport (76 p), government subsidies (93 p) and shopping transport (41 p) contributing the most. We assess a variety of scenarios for adoption of organic farming, localised food systems and sustainable transport to indicate the substantial potential to reduce environmental costs in the UK food system.     

Child dietary quality in rural Nepal: Effectiveness of a community-level development intervention

Nutrition-sensitive agricultural interventions have the potential to improve child dietary quality in rural households, as evidenced by a growing body of work which concurrently measures agricultural and nutrition indicators. Our objective was to investigate whether children in rural farming communities of Nepal participating in a community-level, nutrition-sensitive development intervention had improved dietary quality compared with children living in non-participating matched rural communities. Six rural communities of Nepal where livelihoods were predominantly agricultural were selected to participate in the phased implementation of a community-level development intervention by Heifer International. Households and children in each community were surveyed at baseline, and follow-up surveys were implemented every six months for twenty-four months. Detailed data on food consumption for children older than 6 months of age were collected using a 24 h recall for 17 foods and food groups; parents responded for children. A difference-in-differences model with household fixed-effects and an analysis of covariance model were used to analyze the resulting panel data. Results indicated that the impacts of the intervention varied by agro-ecological region and by season. In the Hills region, which is poorer on average and more conducive to livestock production, children who had received the intervention for two years were 2.2 times as likely to have consumed food from an additional food group, 1.27 times as likely to have achieved minimum dietary diversity and 1.38 times as likely to have consumed animal source foods as children who received the intervention for only one year. In the Terai region, which is more conducive to crop production, there was no significant change in dietary quality attributable to the intervention. These results provide evidence that particularly vulnerable families can take advantage of community-level development activities. Given that the effects of community-level development activities were disparate across communities within the same country, we conclude that tailoring development activities for particular locations is necessary for success.     

Stackelberg versus Cournot oligopoly with private information

We compare an $n$-firm Cournot model with a Stackelberg model, where $n$-firms choose outputs sequentially, in a stochastic demand environment with private information. The expected total output, consumer surplus, and total surplus are lower, while expected price and total profits are higher in the Stackelberg perfect revealing equilibrium than in the Cournot equilibrium. These rankings are the opposite of the rankings of prices, total output, surplus, and profits under perfect information. We also show that the first $n-1$ firms’ expected profits form a decreasing sequence from the first to the $(n-1){}^{st}$ in the Stackelberg game. The last mover earns more expected profit than the first mover if $n\le 4,$ or the ratio of the signals’ informativeness to the prior certainty is sufficiently low. Lastly, there is a discontinuity between the Stackelberg equilibrium of the perfect information game and the limit of Stackelberg perfect revealing equilibria, as the noise of the demand information of firms vanishes to zero at the same rate. We provide various robustness checks for the results when the precision of signals are asymmetric, there is public information or cost/quality uncertainty, or the products are differentiated.     

Base-stock policies for the lost sales inventory system with Poisson demand and Erlangian lead times

The base-stock policies for the studied inventory system can easily be evaluated through Erlang's loss formula when the lead times are mutually independent. This is often the case only if the base-stock $S$ is one. If $S$ is larger than one, the Erlangian lead times become stochastically dependent under the realistic assumption that the replenishment orders do not cross in time. We make this assumption and show for any positive $S$ that the number of replenishment orders outstanding has an equilibrium distribution which is a slightly modified truncated version of a negative binomial distribution. It turns out to be easy to compute the stock-out frequency recursively for $S=1,2,\dots .$ For each $S$, the average stock can be specified in terms of this frequency. We prove that the frequency is convex in $S$. It is therefore straightforward to compute the base-stock for which the average cost is minimized and to compute the minimum average cost. Our numerical study illustrates that the minimum average cost is very sensitive to the shape parameter describing the Erlangian lead times, which is in sharp contrast to the complete insensitivity when lead times are independent.     

Alternatives for Danish agriculture

In the years prior to Denmark's entry into the European Common Market (EEC) in 1973, Danish agricultural exports began to encounter difficulties. As exports account for about two thirds of production in the sector, total agricultural production also stagnated in the 1960s and early 1970s. Entry into the EEC was expected to result in an increase in agricultural production; the increase has, however, failed to materialize.The fact that agricultural production has not increased in the years following entry into the EEC is due to a complex interaction of factors. One explanation is a fall in the number of agricultural holdings which has led to a considerable reduction in the productive capacity of the sector. The relatively high level of interest and costs has also had a dampening impact on the investment propensity. However, in 1977 and 1978 there has been a trend towards an increase in investment in livestock production which indicates an increase in total agricultural production for the years to come.An important part of the Danish economy is the integration of the agricultural sector with the large food processing industry.¹ The links between agriculture and other sectors are rising. The purchase of raw materials and means of production, plus the depreciation of machinery and building requirements, now account for up to 60% of the total agricultural production in terms of value. There is consequently a strong general interest in the future development of Danish agriculture. The recent international recession has also furthered an increased political interest in the exploitation of agriculture. Agricultural policy is thus tending towards a more central importance in the general and the specific economic policies.The central elements of the current discussion have been the volume of the production potential of Danish agriculture, and the market potential existing in the years to come. These considerations are discussed below, on the basis of both historical trends and of a study recently published on alternative development possibilities for Danish agriculture.²     

Grains — more or better storage?

From time to time attention is directed to startling losses in livestock and crops caused by parasites and diseases, many of which occur during storage.¹ It is important that the losses be reduced. Reduction of losses in storage in particular: (a) makes more food available from a given amount produced; (b) makes more of it available for the poor, who suffer most from shortages; and (c) makes it available at the time of greatest scarcity, before the next production season or harvest.² It is, however, equally important that resources should not be wasted in misguided efforts to reduce waste. In the normal condition of cruelly restricted resources, these should be used to reduce waste only if the return in doing so is as good as, or better than, in other activities.     

Health-related attitudes as a basis for segmenting European fish consumers

This paper identifies and profiles consumer segments based on health-related attitudes. Cross-sectional data were collected in 2008 through a pan-European consumer survey (n = 2400) with samples representative for age and region in France, Poland and Spain. Four distinct consumer segments based on health-related attitudes are identified: low interest in healthy eating consumers (29.4%), positive health enthusiasts (28.2%), health strivers (35.0%) and health uninvolved (7.4%). The segments differ significantly with respect to fish consumption, attitudes and knowledge about the health benefits of fish, interest in potential informational cues when purchasing fish, and individual socio-demographic characteristics. The segment low interest in healthy eating is characterised by younger age, more males, higher BMI, low fish consumption and low interest in information, and herewith emerges as a relevant though difficult to reach segment from a food and health policy perspective. Positive health enthusiasts and health strivers have a strong involvement with food, and a strong interest in healthy eating. Both segments have a very favourable disposition towards fish consumption, which would fit with their focus to either stay healthy (positive health enthusiasts) or improve their current health status (health strivers). Health uninvolved consumers do not care strongly about health in general; though attach high importance to eating healthily.     

Fish farming in Europe: Commercial and political dimensions

The author argues that, because of considerable scope for increased production efficiency, farmed fish will provide strong competition for caught fish, and eventually for animal protein from land agriculture. Demand response will be tempered by low price elasticities, while certain other factors (such as the wider choice offered by the growing range of farmed fish species) will stimulate consumption. In all countries, governments have a role to play-eg undertaking basic biological research. This role for government, together with the challenge presented by fish farming to its competitors, explains why politics will be important in determining the rate at which the new industry will expand.