South Africans should not be concerned about the availability of food during the current Covid-19 pandemic. This assurance has been given by the Bureau for Food and Agricultural Policy (BFAP), a Pretoria/Tshwane-based nonprofit organisation (created in 2004 to carry out scientifically rigorous and unbiased research relevant to the agricultural sector).

The United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) reports that Covid-19's negative impacts will lead to a worldwide food crisis unless measures are taken fast to mitigate the pandemic's effects across the food system.

As the world keeps on dealing with the COVID-19 situation, the UN has come out with a warning that the measures taken against the virus could cause global food shortages. More locally, in the US, apple retail sales get a boost and British officials ask their  citizens to help pick fruit and vegetables.

Food supplies shouldn't be too badly affected, but social restrictions will make it hard for many to buy and access food.

What does it help if we pull all the stops to protect our health, but we forget to ensure that everyone has an adequate food supply? The Covid-19 pandemic will accentuate levels of inequality in society in ways we have not anticipated, unless we start paying closer attention to food security among the poorest of the poor.

Most countries around the world have responded to the spread of the coronavirus through large scale lockdowns. With the global economy coming to a near stand-still, trade in food and related essentials has been prioritised to ensure food security.

As the lockdown for families in their homes and the economic impasse regarding businesses that have been closed are beginning to take a toll on communities and households, the reality of food shortages in poor areas is gradually becoming a bigger threat than the coronavirus itself.

COVID-19 has caused widespread turmoil and volatility since the start of 2020 and the measures implemented to contain it have sent shockwaves throughout the global economy.

In an industrial park built off a highway in the arid land between Abu Dhabi and Dubai, a sprawling new indoor farm will soon grow tomatoes under LED lights in a climate-controlled warehouse near a plastic production facility and other factories.

If there is just one outcome from the Covid-19 pandemic in South Africa that could be considered positive, it is this: for perhaps the first time, the reality of household hunger and malnutrition has become visible to policymakers. 

As consumers in the Global North complain about grocery stores stripped of staples, African nations are mobilising to get basic food supplies to their most vulnerable citizens during the COVID-19 lockdown.

 When it comes to bread, the conversation can become politically charged very quickly.

IndexBox latest report has revealed that the revenue of Africa's grain market amounted to $109bn in 2018, picking up by 9% against the previous year. This figure reflects the total revenues of producers and importers (excluding logistics costs, retail marketing costs, and retailers' margins, which will be included in the final consumer price).

Agriculture is a dominant economic activity across Sub-Saharan Africa, except for a few resource-rich economies, such as South Africa, Botswana and Angola. Yet Sub-Saharan Africa is the region with high levels of food insecurity and the most acute levels of malnutrition compared to other regions in the world.

The coronavirus pandemic has laid many things bare, none more so than how interconnected our world is. The impact of globalization is most obvious in the stuttering supply chains that threaten food security worldwide. Maintaining or reweaving these webs is going to take technology, innovation and political determination.

Massive swarms of locusts are sweeping across South Asia, the Middle East and the Horn of Africa. The current outbreak is the worst in recent decades.

Russia, Ukraine and Kazakhstan are turning to policy described as “food nationalism” — protecting their domestic grain markets amid the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, including major grain export restrictions, a highly concerning development for countries dependent on their grain supplies.

Global food and agricultural supply chains are taking strain from disruptions caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. This is the case whether one looks at meat or grain supply chains.

Warren Buffets brutal adage that ‘only when the tide goes out can you see who is swimming naked’ seems especially true during this current crisis.

“Among the things we’ve learnt this week, perhaps we should add that South Africans love a good speech.