Neoliberal Globalization, Migration and Food Security: The Case of Nepal

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NEOLIBERAL GLOBALIZATION, MIGRATION AND FOOD SECURITY: THE CASE

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NEOLIBERAL GLOBALIZATION, MIGRATION AND
5 FOOD SECURITY: THE CASE OF NEPAL
Kanchan Joshi1, Kalpana Khanal2
SUMMARY
Globally, enough food is produced to provide food security for the world’s population. Despite this fact, the
global food crisis seems to be increasing, especially in the agrarian societies of the developing countries.
Though South Asia has been able to improve food production situation substantially in the past 50 years,
it is still home to more than 40 percent of the world’s poor, majority of whom are subsistence farmers.
These subsistence farmers are confronted with multiple problems such as socio-political instability and
uncertainty, and economic stagnation leading to migration of human resources. This causes labor deficiency
in the agriculture sector of source countries. There is a global context to many of the challenges faced by
developing countries while trying to ensure food security and sufficiency. So, it is important to know how
local issues connect to the global context. As the world embraced neoliberal economic policies to promote
a free flow of resources and capital, what implications does neo-liberalization have on food security
conditions of the poor and subsistence farmers? This chapter critically investigates the rarely studied
dimension of the political economy of food security of Nepal linking the local context to the global context.
For our study, we primarily rely on the information extracted from secondary resources that include book
chapters, journal articles, reports, and news articles. We find that there has been a dependency on free
trade, and the unprecedented rise of multinational companies affecting the livelihood of small farmers
in the global context. This chapter also investigates the historical context of the food security situation
in Nepal – comparing the situation between the pre-liberal and the present eras, with particular focus on
the far western region of Nepal. We find that after excessively embracing liberalization policies, the food
sovereignty and sufficiency aspects have gone downhill. Economic squeeze leading to migration have been
influential in mitigating immediate food insufficiency situations. But, in the long run, macro-economic
conditions such as trade balance and inflation rates of the country suffer. So, policies should focus on the
increasing growth of food production within the country, the reduction in food prices in local markets and
the increase in farm income, which improve the poor people’s access to food.
1 INTRODUCTION
Globalization now allows “individuals, corporations, and nation-states to reach around the world farther,
faster, deeper and cheaper than ever before” (Friedman, 2000: p.9). However, as human beings, we face a
sad reality today. The FAO (2017) data shows that in spite of increases in the global supply of food, 895
million people are undernourished and suffering from chronic food insecurity. The FAO further reports
that of the 2.1 billion poor people of the world surviving on less than US$3.10 a day, 1.75 billion people
live in the low and lower middle-income countries (FAO, 2017), with a vulnerability to food insecurity.
Thus, food security is a major global challenge and is an important issue for the governments as well as
for international organizations such as the World Bank, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and
Development (OCED), and the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO).
Macquarie University, Australia

1
Correspondence: Nichols College, USA. E-mail: kalpana.kalpanakhanal@gmail.com.

2
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Neoliberal globalization, migration and food security
The FAO (1996) emphasizes the complex and multidimensional nature of food security by stating that,
“Food security exists when all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient, safe
and nutritious food to meet their dietary needs and food preferences to lead a healthy and active life.” This
definition includes multi-dimensional aspects such as the availability, access to and biological utilization
of food. A peaceful, stable and enabling political, social and economic environment allows states to set
adequate priority to food security and minimization of poverty. According to FAO (1996),
“Democracy, promotion and protection of all human rights and fundamental freedoms, including the
right to development and the full and equal participation of men and women, are needed to achieve
sustainable food security for all.”
The World Bank (1986) defines food security as “access by all people at all times to enough food for an
active and healthy life.” The OECD (1981) defines food security as an “adequate and stable supply of farm
products and food for domestic use.” Inequitable access to food and resources is one of the factors causing
food insecurity and hence impacting on overall social provisioning of the people within a state (Gollin et
al., 2007). Researchers have also noted that food security can move beyond national boundaries and create
repercussions on international relations (Bryant and Kappaz, 2005; Jenkins et al., 2007). Jenkins et al.
(2007) further noted that the impact of food crises may go beyond national boundaries through refugees and
migration and can lead to intervention by national governments and international organizations.
South Asia faces the greatest hunger burden, with the highest rate, 14.7 percent of undernourishment
and the most numbers of the hungry in Asia. This region includes Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nepal and
India, among others (FAO et al., 2018). In more recent times, zero hunger has been identified as one of the
17 sustainable goals identified by the United Nations to transform the world’s sustainability. However, a
void in the literature exists when it comes to the economic and political determinants of food availability
and access (Mihalache-O’keef and Li, 2011). The purpose of this chapter is to delve into the political
economy as an aspect of food security in the developing world broadly and Nepal specifically through the
use of the dependency theory.3
The chapter is organized into five sections. The first section introduces the concept of food security and
considers how various international organizations are addressing the issue. The second section highlights
the global context of changes in food governance, production, distribution, and consumption during the
neoliberal era.4 This section also critically investigates the changing institutions of food provision—from
NGOs to the World Trade Organization in terms of governance, and from small producers to transnational
corporations. And in terms of development finance, this chapter also looks at the impact of foreign direct
investment (FDI), and remittance flows on food security with specific reference to Nepal. The third section
3
Political economy is the branch of social science that studies the relationships between individuals and society and
between markets and the state, using a diverse set of tools and methods drawn largely from economics, political
science, and sociology.
4
Over the last three decades, economic development policy debate has been dominated by the notion of “Washington
consensus.” The “consensus” reflects the convergence of three institutions based on Washington, D.C., the World
Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the US Treasury Department. The consensus has also been expanded
to include other institutions such as the World Trade Organization and the European Central Bank (Filho, 2005).
Neoliberalism became the dominant economic model and was based upon “a theory of political economic practice that
proposes that human-beings can best be advanced by liberating individual entrepreneurial freedoms and skills within
an institutional framework characterized by strong private property rights, free markets, and free trade” (Harvey, 2005:
p.2). Neoliberalism stresses the importance of the free market and encourages greater geographic range thus leading to
globalization (Harvey, 2005). “The assumption that individual freedoms are guaranteed by freedom of the market and
of trade is a cardinal feature of neoliberal thinking, and it has long dominated the United States stance toward the rest
of the world” (Harvey, 2005: p.7).
79
explores food security policies in the country during pre-liberalization phase, during liberalization phase
and after liberalization. This section also provides the current state of the Nepal's agriculture and status of
food security and sufficiency, shedding some light on the historical context of food security/sufficiency
and public policies to address the issue. The fourth section delves into the implications of migration and
remittance flows to food security and sufficiency. The section will also explore the food sovereignty issue as
the agrarian workforce moves away from the agricultural sector to work in the perceived higher return non-
skill sector overseas or in nearby cities. The fifth section concludes by offering policy recommendations to
ensure food security and sufficiency.
2. GLOBAL FOOD SECURITY DURING THE NEOLIBERAL ERA

2.1 Liberalization and Food Security
To achieve the food security goals espoused by international organizations such as the World Bank and the
OECD, a systems view is required. That is, when everything is connected, the perfect economic system is
one with efficient feedback loops and harmony between supply and demand. Based on this view, the role
of the politicians and the government is to remove anything that interferes with free trade. The OECD
assesses producer subsidies and criticizes the European Union (EU) and the U.S. for directly and indirectly
subsidizing their farmers. The overarching argument is that subsidies distort the functioning of free markets
(Lang, 2002).
Various bilateral, regional, and multilateral trade and investment agreements among the countries
provide a framework, following which developing countries were expected to comply with Global
Standard Institutions (GSIs), with the goals to achieve free trade, starting in the mid-1990s. The World
Trade Organization (WTO) prescribed American-style Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs) laws, through
the Trade-related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) agreement, to many developing countries. Similarly,
the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) influenced the regulating institutions in the member
countries. The GSIs adoption was deemed further important by the IMF and the World Bank loan/aid
conditionalities, the OECD, the Group of Seven (G7), the World Economic Forum, and many other think-
tanks and policy forums dominated by the donor countries (Chang, 2011). However, the GSIs has been
evaluated as follows:
“The GSIs inherently favor the rich over the poor, capital over labor, and finance capital over industrial
capital. Therefore, many rich people, especially financial capitalists, in developing countries have been
very much in favor of GSIs. Also, some of the free-market ideologues in developing countries were even
more dogmatic than the ones from the rich countries in a manner that the Latin Americans describe as
being more Catholic than the Pope” (Chang, 2011: 475).
Agricultural products were formally included for the first time in the General Agreement on Tariffs
and Trade (GATT) in 1994. The changing global dynamics of demand and the acceptance of “free trade”
approach by developed and developing countries also led to a more open global agricultural marketplace
and, ultimately, to cheaper food (Hawkes, 2006). Trade liberalization removed barriers to foreign investment
in food distribution and allowed multinational food companies and fast-food chains to expand into new
countries (Kearney, 2010; Wilkinson, 2009). Liberalization allowed easy access to different types of food
and, often, high-calorie processed foods. The decline in food prices has also been linked to the increment in
the food portion consumed by people, and in turn, increasing their risk of obesity (Sturm and Datar, 2005).
Research conducted by the United Nations on transnational corporations (United Nations, 1981), and
Tansey and Worsley (1995) pointed out high levels of business concentration in the global food system.
For instance, Cargill, a corporate company of agricultural products, has 60 percent of the world cereal trade
80
(Lang and Hines, 1993), and the Swedish chocolate group – Barry Callebaut, Olam International also has
60 percent of the world cocoa trade (Terazono, 2014).5
Many non-governmental organizations have become disenchanted with trade liberalization because
of the recognition of economic power and concentration especially in the food sector (Lang, 2002). For
instance, the Liaison Committee of Development NGOs to the European Community (2000:3) argued that:
“Reliance on trade to achieve national food security is not usually an appropriate policy, for developing
countries’ dependence on food imports creates vulnerability to world markets and prices. In reality,
trade flows are controlled more by powerful corporations than by governments. We urge a greater
degree of self-reliance in food production, at the national or regional level.”
Relying on external trade can have a devastating effect on peripheral countries. Via Campesina (1996),
a world coalition of peasant organizations, which met in 1996 in Mexico argued that,
“The prevailing neoliberal economic system has been the main cause of the increasing impoverishment
of farmers and rural people in general. It is responsible for the increasing degradation of nature, land,
water, plants, animals and natural resources, having put all these vital resources under a centralized
system of production, procurement and distribution of agricultural products within the frame of a
global market-oriented system.”
Mexico embraced trade liberalization in the 1980s and reached the peak of free trade in 1994. The same
year Mexico, the United States and Canada enacted the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).
The main goal was to transform the Mexican diet and food ecosystem increasingly to mirror those of the
United States. However, the reality turned out to be different. Obesity rates spiked in Mexico. While 7
percent of Mexicans were obese in 1980, the rate tripled to 20.3 percent by 2016 (Jacobs and Richtel, 2017).
Wise, a trade expert at the Small Planet Institute and Tufts University observed that - “the only way that
Mexico became a ‘first world’ country was in terms of diet (Jacobs and Richtel, 2017).”
Wimberley (1991) and Wimberley and Rosario-Bello (1992) applied the dependency theory to argue
that investment dependence can have a stronger negative effect on food consumption as compared to that
of primary export dependence.6 The dependency theory was developed and popularized by Latin American
scholars in the 1960s. Its overarching argument is that the economic growth and prospects for development
in poor countries (the periphery) heavily depends on the global economy where developed countries (the
core) dominate the policy sphere. Frank (1966), one of the main proponents of the dependency theory,
argued that today’s poor countries are poor because of an international economy that is forever biased
against them.
According to Wimberley and Rosario-Bello (1992), the presence of multi-national corporations (MNC)
may reduce food security in periphery countries. Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) promotes markets
for luxury goods that decrease consumer demand. Also, they perceive multinationals as causing higher
unemployment and underemployment.7 More recently, Mihalache-O’Keef and Li (2011) elaborated the
5
The five biggest corporations control 77 percent of the cereal trade; the biggest three have 80 percent of the banana
market; the top three have 83 percent of cocoa market and 85 percent of the tea trade (Madden, 1992). When it comes
to agricultural inputs, the top 10 global seed companies control 75.3 percent of commercial seed sales. The world’s 10
leading pesticide companies control 94.5 percent of sales. And, six of the biggest pesticide manufacturers are also six
of the biggest seed companies and together, these six companies control 75 percent of all private sector crop research
(ETC Group, 2013).
6
In the early 1980s, studies on the relationship between FDI (Foreign Direct Investment) inflows and food security have
emerged. The focus was on two contradictory theories: the dependency theory and the modernization theory.
7
Gilpin (1975), using the dependency theory, argued that bigger and powerful countries prefer free and open international
trade and use their influence to persuade other countries to open their markets to foreign trade and investment.
81
work of Wimberley (1991). Wimberley and Rosario-Bello (1992) and Firebaugh and Beck (1994) studied
the relationship between sectoral FDI and food security. Their analysis was based on both dependency and
modernization theories. Their observations, based on a sample of 56 developing countries, from 1981 to
2001, showed the negative impact of FDI on food security. These adverse effects could be explained in
terms of increased unemployment, changes in agricultural land use patterns, and negative environment and
demographic externalities.8
2.2 Remittances Flows and Food Security

Over the past couple of decades, the picture of development finance in the world has been changing.
Remittance flows have surpassed total development aid and have become the second largest, and for some
countries, even the largest source of financial flow to developing countries after foreign direct investment
(FDI). The World Bank statistics show that remittance flows to developing countries are estimated to have
reached 416 billion US dollars in 2013, 431 billion US dollars in 2014, and 441 billion US dollars in 2015
(World Bank, 2016). Burgess (2009) sees neoliberal reforms as the main factor affecting two structural
transformations, namely the reduction in the role of the state and integration into the global economy. These
transformations accelerated the flows of migration and remittances between developing and developed
countries and also diversified the senders and recipients of these flows.
While a considerable number of studies have looked at the impact of remittance flows for poverty
reduction in developing countries (Khanal and Todorova, 2019; Kunz, 2011; Reichert, 1981; Rubenstein,
1992), only a small body of literature has examined the impact of remittance flows on food security in
developing countries. For example, Jimenez (2009) in his comparative analysis between remittances-
receiving households and non-receiving households in the Tlapanala village of Mexico, found that the
food consumption patterns did not differ significantly. However, he noted, food consumption expenditures
were higher in remittance-receiving households. Babatunde and Martinetti (2011) in their study of Nigeria
found that remittance income had a positive and significant effect on calorie, but no effect on dietary quality,
micronutrient and child nutritional status.
South Asia is home to more than 22 percent of the world’s total population with more than 17 percent
of them in India. The region has wide spread poverty with 40 percent of world’s poor living in the area;
and one of the worst situations of malnutrition with more than 45 percent undernourished people (Ahmad
et al., 2015). The food availability situation and daily calorie intake have increased overall in South Asia,
and increased food availability has also helped to reduce poverty rates in the region. Though India and
Pakistan are net cereal exporters, other countries of South Asia including Nepal do not produce enough for
themselves (Ahmad et al., 2015). The dependence on other countries for food supply is an indicator of food
instability. With the increase in reliance on agri-commodities from overseas, the vulnerability of Nepali
poor farmers has also increased.
Most of the people in Nepal live in rural areas under subsistence economies. Thus, ensuring food
security amid the increasingly globalized world economy is a challenge. The remaining sections of this
chapter delves into various issues related to food security in Nepal. The next section sheds light on the
8
There is plenty of literature from a modernization theory perspective as well. For example, Rostow (1980) pointed
out that in the long run the modernization process eventually equalizes development levels, real wages, and input
prices around the world. Firebaugh and Beck (1994) looked at the impact of FDI to the question of food security and
suggested that FDI leads to higher productivity. They posited that in the context of globalization, as firms compete
for labor, on the one hand, increased productivity ultimately leads to higher wages and hence FDI entry raises wages
and purchasing power and consequently foreign capital penetration leads to higher caloric consumption. On the other
hand, Jenkins and Scanlan (2001) argued that, while FDI has a relatively less beneficial effect on food supply than
domestic investment, both types of investments contribute to industrialization and growth which eventually improves
food consumption.
82
historical context and provides the current state of agriculture and the status of food security and sufficiency
in the country.
3. THE HISTORICAL AND REGIONAL CONTEXT OF FOOD SECURITY

3.1 The Historical Context of Food Security in Nepal
Reviews of the historical context of food governance and the food security condition are important to
understanding the pre-liberalization and the present era of food security and sufficiency in Nepal. The
first conference on agriculture held by the Government of Nepal linked food insecurity to unprecedented
population growth, environmental problems and low agricultural productivity (Dahal, 1997). Even then,
migration outside the country was discussed as an option people followed to improve their situation.
The food shortages in 1920, after the first World War and in 1934, after the massive earthquake, led the
government to invest in physical infrastructure such as roadways and ropeways connecting the food basket
of Nepal, the Terai and India to Kathmandu to fulfil its needs (Dahal, 1997).
Until the mid-1980s (pre-liberalization phase), government intervention played a crucial role
in food distribution. However, deep-rooted social inequality and biases meant that marginalized
groups were neglected in socio-political and economic development processes, which limited their
access to resources and power (Wisner et al., 2004). The macroeconomic policies were restrictive
and protectionist favoring local industries (Khanal et al., 2005) as it was in the global context (Otero
et al., 2013). That did not help much to improve the food security situation of the country as access to
resources, which included agricultural land for marginalized ethnic and indigenous groups became
restrictive and state-controlled (Pain et al., 2014). Even with occasional and regional food deficiency, till
the mid-1970s, agricultural export was the main contributor to the GDP, generating significant foreign
exchange earnings.
Policy failure to address inequality through land reforms, the inability to commercialize agriculture by
adapting productive agricultural innovations, lack of sufficient investment in irrigation facilities, lack of
spatial integration, accessibility problem of credit and markets, high population growth and deforestation
drive, and lack of alternative livelihood diversification options exacerbated the food insecurity situation in
the 1980s (Sharma, 2005; Perry, 2000; Seddon et al., 2001). During that time, the government also imposed
a ban on the export of rice (Khadka, 1985).
In the mid-1980s, that is during liberalization phase, Nepal faced a severe economic crisis,
with budget deficits and balance of payments problems. The government received loans from the
International Monetary Fund (IMF) to start an economic stabilization program and structural adjustment
programs (Pyakurel et al., 2005). After the initiation of the structural adjustment programs in 1988,
the country removed tariffs and eliminated restrictions on imports of agricultural commodities. As one
of the least developed countries, Nepal was allowed to support its farmers through subsidies under
the “Agreement on Agriculture.” But the government took away the only subsidy it had provided for
buying fertilizers and a host of other support as part of the liberalization drive (Adhikari, 2000). In
South Asia, Nepal was one of the first countries to embrace globalization with extensive liberalization
and trade openness to integrate the local economy with the global economy to achieve economic
growth (Khatiwada, 2005).
In the 1990s and until 2005, neglect of institutional support for agriculture in the name of trade
liberalization, political unrest and conflict augmented the food insecurity problem of Nepal (Pyakurel et al.,
2005). The decade long conflict which ended in 2006, was a result of increasing inequality from the lack of
attention of the elite to the problems of the deprived (Pain et al., 2014), and from the negative spillover of
trade liberalization to agrarian communities (Pyakurel et al., 2005).
Nepal used to be the net exporter of food until the late 1970s but the role has been slowly reversed to a
net importer of food by the late 1980s. The trade balance has been negative since the early 1990s and the
size of the negative balance has been increasing. In the 1990s, the trade deficit in food averaged around 4.5
83
Chapter 5
30
6.8 5.3 3.8

25
6.3 6.9
6.1 6.4
6.1
5.8
5 5.1 7.6
4.6 4.4 5.5
20
3.8
3.1 3.3
1.9 2.8 2.6
1.7 1.6 1 1.3
15 0.9
Percent
14 14 14.2 14.2 14.6

14 14.5
13.7 13.6 13.3 13.4 13.9 14
10
-0.5 -0.5 -0.4 -0.4 -0.5 -0.5 -0.4 -0.6

0 -0.6 -0.7 -0.7 -0.8 -1
1999-01 2000-02 2001-03 2002-04 2003-05 2004-06 2005-07 2006-08 2007-09 2008-10 2009-11 2010-12 2011-13
-5
Year
world Least developed countries Nepal Low-income food-deficit countries
Figure 1. Cereal import dependency of Nepal (1999/01 – 2011/13).

Source: FAO food security indicators (http://www.fao.org/economic/ess/ess-fs/ess-adata/en/ #.WiBY8UqWbIU)).
percent of the total required consumption (Pyakurel et al., 2005). The decline is attributed to inadequate
public expenditure in agriculture. Nepal’s cereal import dependency has increased over time in comparison
to countries with a similar food deficiency situation (Figure 1). The import dependency peaked to 7.6
percent in 2010 as compared to just 1.7 percent in the year 2001.
The share of public spending on agriculture declined drastically from 30 percent in the 1970s to 2.85
percent by 2007 (Shah, 1981; Adhikari, 2010; Paudel, 2011), and in the first eight months of 2017/18, it
was 4.87 percent of the total public expenditure (Government of Nepal, 2018), which was low for a country
highly dependent upon agriculture. The liberalization policies increased income inequality. It favored urban
households over households in the plains (Terai) or the Hill/Mountain households and the rich over the poor
households (Cockburn, 2004; Pyakurel et al., 2005). The positive effect of liberalization would only occur
if income inequality decreases favoring the poor (Bezuneh and Yiheyis, 2009), and this did not happen in
the case of Nepal after embracing trade liberalization.
Believers of liberalization such as Uematsu et al. (2016) argued that the state’s failure to carry out
structural reforms failed the rural households, including subsistence farmers. However, others argued that
trade liberalization might have benefited more prosperous and larger economies (Bezuneh and Yiheyis,
2009), but not the developing countries like Nepal. The open market means access to the products produced
commercially in industrialized and commercialized countries, but at the cost of the local livelihood. The
sustained trade deficit scenario in Nepal demonstrates this (Ghimire, 2016).
84
3.2 The Regional Context of Food Security in Nepal

At the national level, poverty has been declining over the years, but the progress in the fight against poverty
and hunger has not been uniform across the country. Though the prevalence of undernourishment in Nepal
decreased from 15.9 percent in 2005-2006 to 8.5 percent in 2014-2016, it is less likely to achieve food
security situation under the Sustainable Development Goals (FAO et al., 2017). More than 60 percent of
Nepal’s population is dependent upon agriculture and the forestry sector for livelihood, with the contribution
of their share to the GDP of about 33 percent (CBS, 2011).
In this context, food insecurity in Nepal requires investigation into the geographical and regional
distributions. The country’s economic instability, erratic patterns in weather, low investment in research
and development of the agriculture sector, and recurrent natural disasters make food insecurity a chronic
problem. The food security situation has always been more critical in the Mountains, followed by the Hills
and the plains due to the institutional failure of the government to solve accessibility problems to remote
areas. For example, the incidence of poverty ranged from 9 percent in urban populations of the Hills to 42
percent of the rural populations of the Mountains in 2010 (NPC and CBS, 2013).
Many people face both economic and physical constraints even to access minimum food needs. Nepal
has few poor-quality roads with a meager density of 13.5 kilometers per 100 square kilometers of land
area in 2008. This is low as compared with an average of 72 kilometers per 100 square kilometers in
Southern Asia as a whole (WFP Nepal, 2010). In remote areas, limited markets and high transportation
costs lead to high commodity prices. For example, the price of rice can vary as much as three times between
the Terai (a region bordering India, also the most productive agricultural zone in the country) versus the
remote areas. Thus, food security can vary with topography across the country. Lack of diversity in the
diet is another crucial factor that results in undernutrition among children younger than six months of age.
Maternal undernutrition is a severe problem in the country suggesting that poor nutrition constrains growth
even before birth. Thirty-five percent of women of reproductive age and 46 percent of children are anemic
(MoHP, New ERA and ICF International Inc, 2012).
Food aid dependency and focus on a rice-based diet have led to a high level of food insecurity (Mahato,
2011; Lama, 2019). Focusing on a rice-based diet in the hilly regions has been termed “uneven dependency –
a trend to homogenize food-consumption patterns.” Globally, the MNCs orchestrate the homogenization of
food consumption patterns creating uneven dependency (Otero et al., 2013) but Nepal has done it to promote
state nationalism covertly. “Dal (lentils) -Bhat (Rice) -Tarkari (veggies)” have been promoted as the identity
of Nepali food with Bhat replacing marginalized crops (such as maize, finger millet, barley, buckwheat, proso
millet (local name –chino) – a high-value crop in Western countries) from the food table/basket of many Nepali.
Upreti (2015) shared her experience of a visit to the Mugu region, which is a highly food insecure region. The
local people expressed how they are dependent upon the subsidized rice for their food and are embarrassed
to consume local cereals such as proso millet or barley. Upreti (2015) argues that government agencies are
to blame rather than locals for distributing white rice instead of supporting local food to curb food insecurity.
Local cereals such as buckwheat and proso millet have greater nutritional value than rice and are considered
superfoods by nutritionists.
The Karnali region and other far western Hilly and Mountain districts of Nepal have been consistently
food insecure for an extended period. The food insecurity situation was not always worst in the region. The
food security situation plummeted after forced cessation of trade collapsed the livelihood options of locals
(Adhikari, 2008) after 1956 when Nepal and China signed a border treaty restricting cross-border trade.
The region has not been able to recuperate from the economic downfall. The uneven outside dependency
on a rice-based diet, which was previously dependent on Kaguno (fox-tail millet) and chino (proso millet)
(Mahato, 2011; IRIN, 2013), does not help in improving the worsened food security situation. The rice
subsidies provided by the government reduced the ability to cope with farming and farm productivity
shocks by local people.
Also, the yield from the cultivation of local crops has declined and is not able to sustain the local food
requirement (Adhikari, 2010). There is a lack of research and support on these marginalized crops at the
85
governmental level. In these regions, food aid was provided. The food aid does not necessarily discourage
local production but encourages the adoption of rice that cannot be grown locally (Adhikari, 2008). There is
also a decline in the production of traditional varieties of local food due to lack of research and government
stimulus. The main research focus of the research and teaching institute in Nepal has been on wheat, rice,
and potato, respectively (Amgain and Timsina, 2004). The crops grown in food deficit regions have not
generated interest with national policy makers or the research community of Nepal. Thus, the lack of
attention of the government in addressing developmental issues in the disadvantaged areas (economically
and socially), slow economic growth, failures of the government to undergo a structural transformation of
the economy, and a lack of investment in physical infrastructure, all lead to an economic slowdown and
thus food insecurity.
Moreover, in the food insecure regions, the World Food Programme (WFP), the Nepal Food Corporation
(NFC) and various local non-governmental agencies support the locals with food aid especially in the
aftermath of natural disasters. Likewise, regular food aid and activities like “Food for work” have been
ongoing in the remote food insecure regions of Nepal. The total supply of food by these organizations,
however, has not been sufficient. Following liberalization, the government support to the NFC dwindled,
affecting the food supply in the remote regions which used to be dependent on it. According to Nagoda
(2015), the WFP food aid to the highly food insecure Humla region ranged between 400 to 2500 metric
tons in the 2000s. Food aid, which primarily includes rice, has been sporadic and seasonal making up
about 5 percent of the household demand in 2013 (Gautam, 2019). In 2019, the government of Nepal
transported 15,239 metric tons of rice to the food insecure remote regions, which averaged at 30.4 kgs of
rice per capita in Humla, very much less than the average of 87.75 kgs of rice per capita consumed (Lama,
2019). Moreover, increased rice dependency has significant economic implications for Nepal. Overall, the
agrarian economy in Nepal has increased its reliance on rice such that it contributes about 21 percent of
agricultural GDP and rice yield affects the economic outlook of the country (Kumar, 2019). Food aid and
promotion of rice as a status symbol have increased the food dependency on rice affecting the long-term
food security condition (Lama, 2019). In addition to food dependency, a lack of investment in agricultural
research and development of marginal crops redefined the cultivation of those crops as an economically
unviable business (Amgain and Timsina, 2004), leading to severe food insecurity and inaccessibility. The
residents in the food deficit districts of Nepal cope with food insecurity by migrating to India, and overseas.
However, the government of Nepal has been unable to create safety nets and provide the necessary
support to geographically remote regions like Karnali to make food available universally across Nepal
(Pyakurel et al., 2010).
4. MIGRATION, REMITTANCES AND FOOD SECURITY

4.1 The Emergence of Remittance Trends and their Contribution to GDP
The long period of political instability, with more than a decade long political conflict, by which Nepal
went through a political transition from an absolute monarchy to a constitutional monarchy, and then to
the current republic of Nepal has altered the social fabric of Nepal. At the same time, the economy of the
country has experienced an ebb and flow pattern during this period.
Nepal’s annual real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth averaged 4.4 percent between 2006 and
2015, and per capita GDP increased from the US $420 to $762 (NRB, 2016) (Figure 2). The growth in the
GDP is below par as compared to neighboring countries such as India and China, which had nearly double-
digit GDP growth during that period.
Agriculture is the single largest employer in the world, providing livelihoods for 40 percent of today’s
global population, and 65.6 percent of the Nepali population (MoAD, 2013/2014). It is also the largest
source of income and jobs for poor rural households (United Nations, 2017). Many Nepali youths, especially
agriculture-dependent ones, opted for out-migration to get away from economic stagnation and by 2010,
55 percent of Nepali households received remittances (CBS, 2011). Migration is not a new phenomenon to
Nepal since the country has a long history of domestic and foreign migration (Seddon et al., 2001; Thieme
86
60.0
50.0
40.0
Percent
30.0
20.0
10.0
0.0
2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016
Year
Agriculture, value added (% of GDP)

Industry, value added (% of GDP)
Services, etc., value added (% of GDP)
Figure 2. Contributions of agriculture, industry and services value added as percentage of GDP, Nepal
(2004-2016).
and Wyss, 2005). However, foreign labor migration in recent years has risen phenomenally. Nepal has
become one of the largest originating countries of labor migration (Poertner, Junginger and Müller-Böker,
2011) and the largest recipient of remittances in South Asia while the country ranked third in the world
in terms of the contribution of remittances to GDP (World Bank, 2014). A recent study found that in the
rural areas of Nepal, remittance income contributed to 23.68 percent of total household income (NRB,
2016). The recent GDP growth is primarily brought by the tertiary sector, which is comprised of trade
and commerce, communications, tourism and IT services (Table 1). The agriculture sector performance as
measured by the GDP has been disappointing (Sharma, 2015).
Table 1. Agriculture and forestry sector contribution to GDP and annual growth rate from 2006/07 to
2016/17.
Year Agriculture and forestry sector

Contribution to GDP in % Annual growth rate %
2006/07 32.05 0.94

2007/08 31.22 5.80
2008/09 32.54 2.98
2009/10 35.00 1.99
2010/11 36.68 4.49
2011/12 34.82 4.58
2012/13 33.40 1.07
2013/14 32.16 4.54
2014/15 31.27 1.00
2015/16 31.13 -0.19
2016/17 28.89 5.25
Source: Government of Nepal (2018).

87
Despite having modest GDP growth, gross consumption in Nepal is relatively high. The increased
purchasing power of Nepali people in recent times can be attributed to remittance inflows (World Bank,
2017). The remittance-fueled consumption boom has been a contributing factor to the robust growth in
imports. The average growth in exports was 4.2 percent in the last decade, whereas growth in imports
during the same period was 18.2 percent (Ghimire, 2016). While the average contribution of personal
remittances was just 3.8 percent of the total GDP of South Asia in 2016, the contribution of remittances to
GDP in Nepal increased from a meager 2 percent in 2000 to 29.68 percent in 2016 (Figure 3).
Khanal (2011) points out that the additional disposable incomes in the hands of families receiving
remittances are accountable for rising food prices and thereby overall high inflation over the last five
years (2008-2012). The last five years are the ones in which remittances also increased sharply every year.
Not only the land owning farmers have benefitted because of the rising prices of food-grains and other
agricultural produce, but farm wages have also gone up sizably. By observing the 2010 data, Khanal (2011)
notes that the farm wage index went up at a much higher rate than the overall wage index. The farm wage
index went up, respectively, by 20 percent, 24 percent and 32.3 percent in 2010.
While Khanal (2011) identifies the rise in wages as a positive effect because it provides incentives to
farming activities leading to the increased supply of farm workers and secondly, it creates disincentives
for foreign employment; many other economists, such as Basyal (2009), Bresser-Pereira (2008, 2010),
recognize rising wages as a consequence of an influx in foreign exchange. Higher remittances enable a
population to enjoy higher welfare through higher consumption, but higher consumption fueled by high
rates of remittances lead to strong import demand and a widening of the trade deficit that could offset the
Chapter 5
benefits of remittance inflow. The balance of payments situation of Nepal has been negative since the 1990s
and has been widening, especially with the biggest trading partners of Nepal – India and China (Ojha,
2013). In Nepal, both exports and the manufacturing sector as shares of the GDP have persistently declined.
35.0
31.58
29.00
30.0
29.68
29.44
25.0 23.21
22.30 25.43
Contribution to GDP (%)
21.74
20.0 21.65
16.79
15.0
10.0
5.0
2.0
0.0
2000 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016
Year
Figure 3. Remittance flow to Nepal as percent of GDP.

Source: World Bank (2017).
88
The manufacturing output as a share of the GDP during the eleven years period (2001-2016) shows a
consistent
Chapterdecline
5 from 9.3 percent to 5.8 percent respectively (Figure 4). The poor business environment
and deterioration of public security also contributed to the stagnation of manufacturing after 2001.
35
31.6
29 29.4 29.7
30
25.4
25 23.1
21.7 21.7 22.3
20
Percent
16.9
16
14.9
15
12.2
11.2 11.3
9.3 8.8
10 8.4 8.3 8.2 7.8 7.7 7.6 7.1 6.6 6.4 6.6 6.6 6.5 6.3 5.8
5 2.5
0
2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016
Year
Manufacturing (value added) Remittance (value added)
Figure 4. Manufacturing and remittance as percent of GDP.

Source: World Bank, 2017.
4.2 The Impact of Remittances on Poverty or Food Security

A comparison of the three cycles of Nepal Living Standard Surveys (CBS, 1995/96, 2003/04, 2010/11)
reveals drastic changes in the structure of household economies caused mainly by remittances. These
studies also show that an overwhelmingly large portion of non-farm income in rural areas comes from
remittances from abroad. In a way, out-migration has been a newly found key livelihood strategy of rural
households in improving food security and reducing poverty (Gartaula et al., 2012). Nepal has shifted from
an agriculture-based economy to a remittance-based economy.
There has been a large-scale decline in poverty in Nepal, which is primarily credited to the impact of
remittances. Many of the improvements of economic indicators in Nepal, such as an increase in wage rates
and urbanization are also the results of remittances (Ghimire et al., 2012). The NLSS III estimated a poverty
rate of 25.1 percent for 2010/11. This follows a previous substantial decline in absolute poverty from 42
percent in 1995/96 to 31 percent in 2003/04 (CBS, 2006).9 According to the National Planning Commission
(NPC), the reduction in poverty to 25.4 percent by the end of 2009 is mainly attributed to remittances
(MoLTM and IOM, 2010).10
9
Based on NLSS data collected in 2003/04, it was estimated that if there was no remittance income, poverty would
have declined to 36 percent in 2003/04, instead of 31 percent with remittance, from a high of 42 percent in 1995/96.
10
Although studies such as Singh (2012) suggest that Nepal’s recent alleviation in absolute poverty level is directly
linked to the increase in remittances from abroad, there are dangers to becoming a remittance-based economy. As with
any globalizing measure or economic liberalization, the country becomes ingrained in the global economy to such an
extent that it is highly vulnerable to the inevitable fluctuations of economic performance in other parts of the world.
Economic diversification seems necessary for the furthering development of Nepal.
89
Table 2. Remittance flow in Nepal during 1995/96, 2003/04, 2008 and 2010/11.
Description 1995/96 2003/04 2008 2010/11
Percent of households receiving remittances 23.4 31.9 30 55.8

Average amount of remittance per recipient 15,160 34,698 65,755 80,425
household (nominal Nepali rupees (Rs))
Share of remittances (percent)
From Nepal 44.7 23.5 16.8 19.7
From India 32.9 23.2 16.8 80.3
From other countries 22.4 53.3 69.8
Share of remittance on the income of recipient 26.6 35.4
households - -
Per capita remittance amount for all Nepal 625 2,100 4,042 9,245
(nominal Rs)
Total remittances received in Nepal (nominal) 12.9 46.30 185 259
in billion Rs.
Poverty rate (percent) 42 32 - 25.16
Source: CBS (2006, 2011).

*Estimated with the assumption that the population in 2008 was 27 million.
The NLSS data also reveals that there has been a significant increase in households receiving remittances,
rising from 31.9 percent to 55.8 percent since 2003/04. Over this period, remittances have increased from
Rs. 35 billion (2003/04) to Rs. 208 billion (2009/10). The per capita remittance income has also increased
from Rs. 625 (1995/96) to Rs. 2,100 (2003/04) to Rs. 9,245 (2010/11) per year. NLSS III also indicates
that 79 percent of remittances are used for daily consumption and only 2.4 percent is invested for capital
formation. Out of the remaining proportion, 7.1 percent is used for repaying loans, 3.5 percent for education
and 4.5 percent for the household property.
4.3 Policy Challenges in the Global Context

Throughout global history, the agricultural and food sector is one of the focus areas of governmental
interventions. When it comes to formulating food security policies there are several things to be noted by
policymakers. Agricultural policies can cause food prices to spike (Anderson et al., 2013). Changes in food
prices can make some people winners and others losers (Swinnen and Squicciarini, 2012).
For decades, agricultural protection and subsidies in high-income and some middle-income countries
have been known as contributing factors in reducing international prices of farm products (Tyers and
Anderson, 1992; Rausser and de Gorter, 1989). By providing unwarranted resource and price advantages
to farmers in high-income countries, protectionist policies of high-income countries lead to international
income inequality and poverty in developing countries (Anderson et al., 2010). In turn, earnings of farmers
and small rural businesses in developing countries drop. The World Bank (2017) also recognized that
distortions in policies and prices in the developed world added to global inequality and poverty, given
that agriculture is the major source of income for three-quarters of the world’s poor.11 The existence of
Symptoms of widespread policy and international governance failures can be found in both developing and developed
11
countries. Although economists such as Irwin (2002) have argued against agricultural subsidies and trade barriers for
decades, vested interests and political forces continue to dominate domestic agricultural policy in both rich and poor
countries. Developing country policies are also responsible for depressing price incentives for their own farmers,
which, in turn, exacerbates the deleterious effects of the richer countries’ narrow focus on domestic consumers.
90
agricultural subsidies can cause a geographical mismatch in the quantity of agricultural production, that is,
overproduction in high-income countries and underproduction in low-income countries (Johnson, 1991).
While agricultural subsidies are still prevalent in developed nations, many have removed existing
protectionist policies in support of trade liberalization and instead embraced taxing farmers as a policy. In
some cases, farmers are taxed more heavily than producers in other sectors (Anderson et al., 2013).12 Many
developing countries have embraced the overvaluation of their currency to pursue an import-substituting
industrialization strategy.
Agricultural supply management has been replaced with highly imperfect/incomplete “free” markets
that were commonly export-oriented because of stabilization, privatization, and liberalization policies
implemented across developing countries over the past three decades (Akram-Lodhi, 2014). These
policies gave power to global oligopolies in setting prices and standards for inputs, trading, distribution,
and retailing, thereby exposing farmers to vulnerable world market prices. Neoliberal globalization and
structural adjustment programs lead to a global agrarian crisis. The rise in food prices since 2007 has
worsened the food security conditions for the group of people whose livelihoods have been considered
historically insecure (Akram-Lodhi, 2012).
The globalization process is driven by the homogenization of culture/food and puts Northern tastes at
the center. Lang (2002) argues that this poses a huge challenge to thinking about food policy in general
and food security.13 In today’s globalized world market, solutions are offered as a panacea for all ills. The
dominant economic development theory, for the past four decades, sees trade as the key to generating
wealth and that wealth as the key to human happiness (Lang, 2002). Figure 5 depicts how the global
food trade trend has increased steadily in the past three decades. Table 3 shows a rise in both total and
agricultural trade between 1995 and 2016.
Table 3. World trade in goods and services.
World trade 1995 2005 2010 2016
Agricultural trade in billion US $ (exports) 361.2 538.6 870.3 1,054.7

Agricultural trade in billion US $ (imports) 374.9 565.2 884.5 1,054.6
Total trade in billion US $ (exports) 468.3 1,149.8 1,681.7 1,463.9
Total trade in billion US $ (imports) 473.9 1,047.4 1,510.1 1,474.9
Source: https://wits.worldbank.org/CountryProfile/en/Country/WLD/StartYear/1988/EndYear/2016/
TradeFlow/Export/Indicator/XPRT-TRD-VL/Partner/WLD/Product/Total.
While overall agricultural trade has gone up, the increase in imports has surpassed an increase in exports
in developing countries. Growth in imports also implies the lack of redistribution of land and wealth as well
as a lack of bargaining power for those whose food needs are most pressing (Lang, 2002). In this context,
the new agenda for food policy requires a shift away from cheap, export-led food policies to more local
production for local use, to shift the bargaining power between small and large farmers.
12
A well-known example is the taxing of exports of plantation crops in postcolonial Africa (Bates, 1981).
13
During the initial stage of the food security debate, back in 1974, there was more resistance regarding unequal
food share and there was a belief that policies and politics could, and should, do something to improve the unequal
distribution (Lang, 2002). Academics like Frank (1978) invited the concerned to put food distribution into the wider
context of the historic forces of capitalism, identifying the struggle to feed a people as part of the struggle to gain
independence from profiteers.
91
4.4 The Challenges of Food Security in Nepal

It is now widely known that remittances from migrant workers have been the biggest contributor to
reducing poverty. Have remittances helped improve the food security situation? This question needs a
more profound understanding. Based on the FAO, IFAD and WFP (2013), while remittance income helped
reduce poverty, migration adversely affected agricultural productivity because migrants are usually young
male members of farm families. In the context of Nepal, the structure of the traditional farming households
has been dismantled in most cases, with the farm workforce of young adults leaving their homesteads
for a long period. Farming now depends on female members left behind. An estimated 30 percent of the
poor now live in female-headed households and most of them continue to farm. Women play a larger role
in food production now than ever, hence policies should be put in place to enable women with a goal to
enhance productivity.
A study in Nepal revealed that out-migration of youths hurts long term domestic food security and
food sovereignty by making the agricultural sector less productive, unsustainable, and vulnerable in the
communities at home (Craven and Gartaula, 2015). In the case of economic slowdown or political problem
in the region where migrants work, it could negatively impact their family’s food security situation at
home. Though Nepal has inducted “food sovereignty” as a fundamental right in its constitution, it has not
been able to achieve the food sovereignty status readily. Nepal has not been able to achieve production
sufficiency, which could be shown by its negative trade balance due to high levels of food imports (Figure
1 for cereal import dependency). In 2017, about 32 districts out of the 75 districts were affected by varying
degrees of food insecurity (GoN et al., 2017) with the worst affected being the districts of Karnali and the
Mountain regions of Gorkha and Dhading.
Likewise, the economic slowdown in the provider or migrant-receiving countries could affect the
job prospects of migrant workers negatively. Hence stability of remittance-based economies depends
on business cycles in host countries. Unless employment opportunities are expanded, sustaining
the poverty reduction and food security achieved due to spillover effects of migration is difficult.
Several studies have analyzed the broader roles of remittances on development (Khanal and Todorova,
2019; Kapur, 2005; Simmons, 2008). These studies challenge the underlying premises of remittance-
development nexus and the overall conclusion regarding remittances as beneficial for development
(Grabel, 2010). Kapur (2005) sees remittances as useful for poverty alleviation but warns that long-
term effects are not so clear. The effects can vary highly in terms of complexity. While migration can
reduce poverty for many, it can lead to distributional challenges, deepening inequalities (Sunam
and McCarthy, 2016).
In Nepal, the out-migration of the male population increased access to education for girls, delayed
marriage, reduced total fertility, reduced population growth, and lowered the dependency ratio (Shakya
and Gubhaju, 2016). The decline in fertility rate and increase in the proportion of senior citizens might
negatively impact socio-economic, cultural and political fabrications and agricultural productivity in Nepal.
It is primarily because of the decrease in the ratio of the economically active population to senior citizens
(Klien and Yasukawa, 2016). The government must work out early on how to deal with the aging population
of Nepal. The short-term impacts of migration have been positive in terms of food security and increased
consumption behavior of migrant households. However, in the long run, the macro-economic situation of
the country suffers, which is observed in terms of the huge gap in trade deficits due to increased reliance on
consumption of imported goods (Ghimire, 2016).
5. CONCLUSIONS AND POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS

Food insecurity is recognized as an important issue by major international organizations around the
world, including the World Bank, the OECD, the IMF, the WTO and others. Most of these international
agencies regard international trade as the way forward. To achieve the same goal of ensuring a “free
market,” developing countries were required to adopt the Global Standard Institutions (GSIs) by various
international organizations.
92
Nepal was not an exception to adopting the GSIs. From the 1990s and until the mid-2000s, institutional
support to agriculture was neglected in the name of trade liberalization. This along with political unrest
and conflict augmented the food insecurity problem of the country. Public spending on agriculture
declined from 30 percent in the 1970s to 2.79 percent by 2010, which was very low for a country that
is highly dependent upon agriculture. The liberalization policies increased income inequality. It favored
urban households over rural households in the plains (Terai), Hills and Mountains and the rich over
poor households. Persistent food insecurity problem, occasional food crises and the vulnerable livelihoods
of large segments of farming and rural populations are one of the pressing challenges facing Nepal today.
So, some of the main goals of food security policies should include improving agricultural productivity
to achieve growth in food production, reduction in food prices in local markets and the increment
in farm income.
Youth migration from rural to urban areas, to the Middle East, East Asia, North America, Europe and
Australia is on the rise. The decline in agricultural productivity looms as a major issue as the farming labor
force is on the decline. The Nepali economy has transitioned from an agriculturally based economy to a
remittance-based economy. While remittance flow has positively contributed to poverty reduction, food
security still needs significant attention. Although remittance has increased access to disposable income,
more remittance has been spent on consumption fueling the demand for imported items. A high demand of
imported goods and stagnancy in the production sector have widened the trade deficits, in turn, offset the
positives of the remittance influx that could lead to “Dutch disease” (World Bank, 2011; Knight, 2014).
Studies have shown that remittances are not spent on quality foods and micronutrients. Instead, the market
share of imported processed food (CGIAR, 2016), which is of low nutritious value, is on the rise.
Given this context, the government’s food security related policies should try to incorporate remittances
and nutrition-related awareness, especially to people in regions facing severe food insecurity. This step
will make remittances to have a more favorable effect on the household’s nutrition outcomes. A cursory
look at migration patterns from Nepal shows that people who out-migrate are usually the male members of
farm families. And the structure of the traditional farming households has been dismantled in most cases
and farming now depends on female members left behind. An estimated 30 percent of the poor now live in
female-headed households and most of them continue to farm. Women play a more significant role in food
production now than ever; hence policies should be put in place to enable women to enhance productivity.
Access to food is a major challenge in developing countries like Nepal, where the average per
capita spending on food is 60 percent (Kaur and Kaur, 2016). Access to food could be influenced
negatively by inflation and increased prices of agricultural commodities. Physical facilities such as
road connectivity, access to credit facilities, and access to markets could also influence access to
food. Therefore, in the long run, government policies should focus on building a better quality of life
for people by generating employment opportunities in the country. Moreover, policy makers should
focus on increasing investment in the development of physical infrastructures such as roads and
telecommunications, strengthening agricultural production by following innovative pathways, and
creating an economically competitive environment for the agriculture sector. The country should go
through structural transformation, to reduce income and regional inequalities and create employment
opportunities beyond agriculture. Policy geared towards social justice-based land reform, promotion of
agricultural innovation, increased investment in irrigation, and access to credit to the rural poor and farmers
should be implemented.
In order to reduce income inequality and improve food security/sovereignty policies, the government
should promote the idea of local and social control of food systems and shortened trade circuits.
Reducing the distance food travels is important, because “food-miles” could be a useful indicator of
energy use and carbon footprint. This also helps address the key issue of bio-diversity. The more local
93
food is, the more farmers have to plant and grow a variety of crops.14 To address the food insecurity
faced by mountainous regions, research support and government stimulus should be geared towards
marginalized crops such as maize, finger millet, barley buckwheat, proso millet (chino) and other local
germplasms. This will help address food aid dependency caused by focus on a rice-based diet which
has led to high levels of food insecurity. This will also help to mitigate the degrading situation of
traditional biodiversity.15
Organizing rural workers and producers in self-help groups and cooperatives, with a goal of smallholder
empowerment, could be a good way to face food insecurity issues. Smallholder farmers can address both
market-related and policy-related issues through economic mobilization via agricultural cooperatives and
political associations to engage in policy dialogues and advocacy.16 Nepali farmers and producers should
also be encouraged to be a part of alternative food networks associated with fair trade, solidarity purchasing
and collative provisioning in order to foster more equitable agri-food systems (United Nations Inter-Agency
Task Force on Social and Solidarity Economy, 2014). Food cooperatives and producer solidarity can help
improve marketing of locally produced high value food products so that producers get good markets and
prices. This will also improve smallholder farmers’ purchasing power and food security. For example, the
apple producers in Mustang will have access to markets in Beni, Pokhara and Kathmandu.
Natural disasters have intensified the occurrence of concurrent flood, landslides and droughts negatively
impacting agricultural production and productivity. In the Terai region, which used to be a food surplus
region, climate induced disasters such as concurrent flooding and droughts have negatively affected food
security. Heavy rainfall in August 2017 inducing severe flash floods and landslides in Nepal caused major
crop losses of 57 million USD in 30 out of 75 districts, of which crop losses in 10 districts of the Terai
accounted for 56.7 million USD (Government of Nepal et al., 2017). In this context, sustainable practices
such as a tendency to employ low-output, low-carbon production methods and respect the principles and
practices of biodiversity and agro-ecology go well for sustainable agricultural intensification.
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NEOLIBERAL GLOBALIZATION, MIGRATION AND FOOD SECURITY: THE CASE

Chapter · August 2020

Kanchan Joshi Kalpana Khanal

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Macquarie University, Australia

Correspondence: Nichols College, USA. E-mail: kalpana.kalpanakhanal@gmail.com.

2. GLOBAL FOOD SECURITY DURING THE NEOLIBERAL ERA

2.2 Remittances Flows and Food Security

3. THE HISTORICAL AND REGIONAL CONTEXT OF FOOD SECURITY

6.8 5.3 3.8

14 14 14.2 14.2 14.6

-0.5 -0.5 -0.4 -0.4 -0.5 -0.5 -0.4 -0.6

world Least developed countries Nepal Low-income food-deficit countries

Figure 1. Cereal import dependency of Nepal (1999/01 – 2011/13).

3.2 The Regional Context of Food Security in Nepal

4. MIGRATION, REMITTANCES AND FOOD SECURITY

Agriculture, value added (% of GDP)

Year Agriculture and forestry sector

2006/07 32.05 0.94

Source: Government of Nepal (2018).

Figure 3. Remittance flow to Nepal as percent of GDP.

Manufacturing (value added) Remittance (value added)

Figure 4. Manufacturing and remittance as percent of GDP.

4.2 The Impact of Remittances on Poverty or Food Security

Description 1995/96 2003/04 2008 2010/11

Percent of households receiving remittances 23.4 31.9 30 55.8

Source: CBS (2006, 2011).

4.3 Policy Challenges in the Global Context

Table 3. World trade in goods and services.

World trade 1995 2005 2010 2016

Agricultural trade in billion US $ (exports) 361.2 538.6 870.3 1,054.7

4.4 The Challenges of Food Security in Nepal

5. CONCLUSIONS AND POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS

Akram-Lodhi, A. H. (2014). The antinomies of food financialization. [Review of the “Derivatives

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