1. A HUNGRY MAN IS AN
ANGRY MAN: FOOD
SECURITY AND CUBA-
CARIBBEAN
INITAITIVES

2. OVERVIEW
Reorient the agenda from state security to
human security
Assess the food security dilemma in the
Caribbean
Examine Cuba’s initiative to alleviate it over time
Review the new measures proposed by Raul
Castro in the agricultural sector as a means to
combating the Cuban food crisis
Explore recent Anglo-Caribbean initiatives in
soliciting Cuban assistance toward resolving the
food security dilemma
Evaluate the imperative for solutions in the
context of traditional state security threats in the
face of violent food riots across the globe
Explore the potential for new avenues of
methodological and theoretical pluralism emerge
as traditional and non-security threats converge

3. FOOD SECURITY
“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 for an active and
healthy life.” (World Food Summit 1996)
Food security refers to a situation where
food production and distribution
systems ensure a sustained food supply
in sufficient quantities and quality at the
national level, and is accessible to all
members of the population (CARDI

4. RE-DEFINIG SECURITY
The focus now is on an emerging post-
positivist paradigm which underscores the
notion of “human security” - a people-
centered perspective of security which has
become an imperative in recent times in
order to achieve the universal objectives of
national, regional and global stability.
This entails a deviation from the traditional
realist approach and the emergence of post-
positivist perspectives focusing on military
threats and the security of the state to an
emphasis on the individual as the more
appropriate referent for security in what is
being defined as the New Global Disorder

5. THE CARIBBEAN’S FOOD SECURITY
PROBLEMATIQUE
Limited land-holdings: In the Caribbean the
amount of land people own tends to run
extremely small
Farmers that have less that 1 acre of land make
up fifty percent of the farming population and
ninety percent of farmers own less than five acres
Monoculture: Many of the farmers that farm
more than 200 hectors grow their crops in
monocultures
Soil depletion: In smaller farms several
crops are grown on the same piece of land
Farmers harvest all year long, making
production rates to be smaller due to soil
depletion

6. THE CARIBBEAN’S FOOD SECURITY
PROBLEMATIQUE (TRADITIONAL SOURCES)
Agricultural pollution: Raise the costs
of agricultural production through soil
contamination, toxicity and pest
resistance
Natural disasters: Destruction of food
crops by hurricanes and storms. After
hurricanes and tropical storms fishing
industry affected by sedimentation
Neglect of the agricultural sector
because food was cheap. Countries
focused on other sectors

7. GLOBAL DYNAMICS
Fundamental shift in food
producing land usage
Emerging bio- fuels market
Emergence of China and India
and changing patterns of
consumption
Global warming/Climate
change

8. THE CUBAN EXPERIMENT
Background to Cuba’s Food Crisis
Urban agriculture
Parmaculture
Going green: organic/ semi-organic
farms
Bio-pesticides
Bio-fertilizers
State-controlled
corporations/Modern Megafarms

9. RAUL’S NEW INITIATIVES
Vigorously pursing a major expansion
of the program to distribute underused
and fallow farmland to private farmers
and cooperatives in larger quantities
Farmer-friendly policies
Authorized state stores to sell supplies
directly to farmers
The state now providing free fertilizer and
feed
Local farming associations are being
empowered to oversee the land
reallocation

10. CARIBBEAN INITIATIVES TO
COMBAT FOOD CRISIS
Caricom
on a two-year suspension of duties on a
Embarked
range of food and other items from milk to meats,
and drastic reduction of tariffs in most of the trade
bloc states for six months
Held a Regional Agriculture Investment Forum on
Jun. 6 aimed at bringing together venture capitalists,
commercial bankers, farmers, agriculture experts,
lobbyists, Caribbean policy makers, including prime
ministers and presidents, and other experts in a
single space to talk solely about agriculture
PetroCaribe
Seek to convert Petrocaribe into a type of anti-

hunger shield

11. CUBA TO THE RESCUE
BILATERAL
TRINIDAD & TOBAGO:
Mega farms
JAMAICA: Technical assistance for
organic farming
Protected agriculture
Greenhouse
Semi-protected technologies.
GUYANA: Technical assistance
Training on impact of climate change on the
agricultural sector)
Help make Guyana’s sugar industry more
competitive

12. A HUNGRY MAN IS AN ANGRY MAN:
CONVERGENCE OF TRADITIONAL AND
NON TRADITIONAL SECURITY THREATS
Wave of violent food riots across the
globe
Convergence of traditional and non-
traditional security threats to both the
individual and the state
Implications for complementary realist
and post-positivist pluralistic theoretical
perspectives in International Relations

13. http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=tAtyjr
ehu94