A Policy Review: Papua New Guinea National Food Security Policy 2018-2027
By John Rina Jr.
Introduction
Papua New Guinea’s National Food Security Policy 2018–2027 focuses on establishing a framework to secure access to safe, nutritious, and affordable food for all citizens. Rooted in the nation’s commitment to the constitutions of human development, the policy highlights the importance of sustainable agricultural growth and improved nutritional outcomes. It promotes public–private partnerships, empowers women, and builds resilience against climate extremes and disasters. Addressing persistent malnutrition and economic challenges in rural areas, the policy aims to transform local food systems. This review provides insights into both positive and negative aspects of Papua New Guinea’s National Food Security Policy (NFSP).
Summary
Papua New Guinea’s NFSP contains, contains five key points
Firstly, the ‘Vision and goals’ of the policy. This key point emphasizes the policy’s aim to ensure that all Papua New Guineans aim to have access to sufficient, safe, affordable, and nutritious food at all times. Its aim also aligns with PNG’s 2050 vision of achieving global sustainable development and a healthy, empowered, educated, and happy population.
Secondly, the ‘five strategic action areas’. First, it focuses on enhancing agricultural productivity by improving smallholder farming, livestock, and fish farming, while strengthening value chains to connect producers with markets. Second, it aims to build resilience in food production systems through climate-smart practices, biodiversity conservation, and sustainable resource management. Third, the policy addresses malnutrition by promoting nutrient-rich crops, diverse diets, and school feeding programs. Fourth, it highlights the empowerment of women in agriculture, recognizing their critical role in food production and household nutrition. Lastly, it seeks to strengthen governance, coordination, and monitoring to ensure effective implementation.
Thirdly, is the ‘challenges addressed’. This policy seeks to address malnutrition as it remains a significant issue with a high rating of stunting, underweight, and wasting among children in PNG. Additionally, it also seeks to address natural vulnerabilities relating to food security such as climate change impacts, land degradation, and limited access to nutritious food in rural areas. The NFSP tends to address these challenges by promoting nutrient-rich crops, diverse diets, and initiatives such as school feeding programs, and by adopting ‘climate smart’ agricultural practices such as crop diversification ensure sustainable productivity, respectfully.
Fourthly, the policy highlights the importance of an affordable ‘monitoring and evaluation (M&E) system’, with efforts led by the Department of Agriculture and Livestock and the National Statistics Office. Regular data collection—covering food productivity, nutrition, stability, and climate patterns—is essential for tracking food security indicators. Analyzing this data can improve food production, nutrition, and stability, while involving women farmers ensures effective outcomes and policy impact.
Lastly, ‘Empowering women’ is a key focus of the policy, recognizing their critical role in food production and nutrition while addressing barriers to empowerment. Women in PNG, comprising 50% of the population with 90% engaged in agriculture, fisheries, and forestry, produce most of the nation’s food yet often remain unrecognized. Agriculture offers a vital entry-point to enhance women’s control over resources, knowledge, and status. Their empowerment improves child nutrition and strengthens household and societal well-being through agriculture (Independent State of Papua New Guinea, 2018).
Critique
The key strength of the NFSP lies its framework. This policy ensures that food security is not treated in isolation but as part of a bigger development strategy. By utilizing agriculture, nutrition, health, and education creates synergies that improve food security and population health. This aligns with the claim that a multi-sectoral approach strengthens food security as part of a broader development strategy (Gaihre et al., 2019).
A key weakness in the NFSP is its ‘implementation due to limited resources and coordination challenges’. The policy's ambitious multi-sectoral approach requires significant financial and human resources, which are often unavailable, particularly at local levels. Additionally, weak governance and fragmented collaboration among stakeholders hinder effective execution. According to Omot (2012), addressing food security in Papua New Guinea necessitates robust coordination and resource allocation to overcome systemic barriers. Strengthening these areas is critical for achieving the policy's goals.
Recommendation
The NFSP recommends that in order to achieve its desired goals and objectives, the framework it provides an effective ‘comprehensive, multi-sectoral approach’, which addresses various aspects of food security such as access, utilization and stability. It also includes agriculture, nutrition, health education, and environmental stability (Independent State of Papua New Guinea, 2018). In doing this, it would drastically improve the lives of all Papua New Guineans.
Additionally, it also recommends that collecting data and information regularly on the issues affecting food security, would aid appropriate government bodies to improve on securing a better food security for the nation.
Conclusion
The overall aim of the Papua New Guinea National Food Security Policy 2018-2027 is to enable all Papua New Guineans to access and consume sufficient, safe, affordable, and nutritious food at all times. It seeks to strengthen food security by improving agricultural productivity, enhancing resilience in food systems, empowering women, and fostering sustainable development through multi-sectoral collaboration to improve the livelihood of all Papua New Guineans.
References
· INDEPENDENT STATE OF PAPUA NEW GUINEA, Department of Agriculture and Livestock, & Allan, B. (2018). Papua New Guinea National Food Security Policy 2018-2027 [Report]. https://faolex.fao.org/docs/pdf/png202059.pdf
· Gaihre, S., Kyle, J., Semple, S., Smith, J., Marais, D., Subedi, M., & Morgan, H. (2019). Bridging barriers to advance multisector approaches to improve food security, nutrition and population health in Nepal: transdisciplinary perspectives. BMC Public Health, 19(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-019-7204-4
· Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research, Templeton, D., Austin, N., Pearce, D., Lopes, M., Nesbitt, H., Omot, N., & Nandlal, S. (2012). Food security in East Timor, Papua New Guinea and Pacific island countries and territories. In D. Templeton & M. Webb (Eds.), ACIAR Technical Reports (Report No. 80; p. 53). Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research.https://www.aciar.gov.au/sites/default/files/legacy/node/14932/tr080_food_security_in_east_timor_papua_new_guin_12173.pdf
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