The Negative Side of the Agricultural‐Nutrition Impact Pathways: A Literature Review

• Published date: 01 March 2015
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.18278/wfp.2.1.5
• Date: 01 March 2015

78

World Food Policy - Volume 2, Number 1 - Spring 2015

I - Introduction

There is a quite large and global

consensus concerning the

necessity to reinforce investments

and interventions in farming and

animal husbandry to achieve food and

nutrition security. Agricultural policies,

particularly those designed to support

small farmers, play a fundamental role

in the ght against undernutrition.

Following the 2008 food price crisis and

the series of articles on maternal and

child undernutrition published in e

Lancet in 2008 and in 2013, there has been

renewed interest in how agriculture aects

nutrition. Ruel, Alderman, and Maternal

and Child Nutrition Study Group (2013)

showed that it is necessary to develop

the so-called “nutrition-sensitive”

interventions, as specic interventions

are insucient. Recent reviews of the

literature (such as those of Masset et

al. 2012) have endeavored to identify

the eects of agricultural development

interventions (ADI) on nutrition, and put

forward recommendations to make them

nutrition sensitive.

Agricultural development interventions and policies have an impact on the

nutrition of individuals through changes in food availability, in food diversity,

in food prices, and changes in farmers’ income. Less straightforward, they also

entail many changes in health environment and in time availability for care

activities. ey nally have impacts on the balance of power both at the intra-

household, community, and global levels. e impact pathways are complex

and interlinked, and many recent studies have primarily focused on their

positive eects. However, some agricultural interventions might have a negative

impact on nutrition in certain cases. is article sets out to identify them,

through a review of the scientic and institutional literature, along with expert

interviews. Six risk categories are proposed, relative to incomes, prices, types

of products, women’s social status and workload, the health environment, and

inequalities. is review underlines the necessity to have an ex ante analysis of

the nutrition impacts of any food or agricultural policy or intervention with “do

not harm approach” regarding the nutrition outcomes. It gives clues to identify

and mitigate the main negative outcome and advocate for more applied and

well-documented research on that topic.

Keywords: nutrition, agriculture, pathways, impact, development

Sandrine Dury,A Arlène AlphaB & Anne BichardC

e Negative Side of the Agricultural–Nutrition Impact

Pathways: A Literature Review

A CIRAD, UMR MOISA, F-34398 Montpellier, France

B CIRAD, UMR MOISA, F-34398 Montpellier, France

C Consultante Indépendante, Ex chef de Mission Action Contre la Faim au Burkina Faso

79

e Negative Side of the Agricultural–Nutrition Impact Pathways: A Literature Review

It is interesting to underline

the fact that these studies sought the

positive eects of interventions, while

agricultural interventions may also have

negative eects, as the impact pathways

are complex and interlocking. Taking a

“do no harm” lens, based on the existing

literature and interviews with experts, this

article proposes to shed some light on the

risks that ADIs might entail for nutrition.

e article sets out to inventory potential

risks, without assessing neither the reality

of the threats nor their relative weight,

which greatly depends on the intervention

contexts. It proposes conceptual guidelines

for agricultural policy or project designers

to assess ex ante likely impacts and to

mitigate the possible drawbacks of their

actions.

e followed methodology of

data collection and analysis is detailed

in Section II. Section III illustrates the

dierent pathways from agriculture to

nutrition. Six dierent risks are identied

and developed in section IV. Discussion

and conclusion are the last two sections.

II - Methodology

Starting from the dierent recent

reports (Webb 2013; World Bank

2007, 2013; du Vachat and ACF

2013), conference presentations (Headey

2013; Hoddinott 2012), books (Fan and

Pandya-Lorch 2012), and scientic papers

(Masset et al. 2012; Ruel, Alderman, and

Maternal and Child Nutrition Study Group

2013; Berti, Krasevec, and FitzGerald

2004) concerning the eect of agriculture

on nutrition, we followed a backward

snowball methodology, identifying each

paper or author, who was quoted about a

possible negative causality. In addition, we

interviewed 15 colleagues, from dierent

backgrounds: history, human nutrition

and epidemiology, agricultural economics

or agronomy from Food and Agriculture

Organization - FAO, Action Against

Hunger (Action Contre la Faim in French

– ACF), Institut de Recherche pour le

Développement - IRD, and Centre de

coopération Internationale en Recherche

Agronomique pour le Développement

- Cirad about their knowledge of

existing literature or empirical evidences

concerning a possible negative eect of

certain types of projects or policies on

nutrition.

Altogether, we gathered 171

dierent documents, in English and in

French, all written between 1980 and 2013.

We excluded from this stock of documents

all references presenting neutral impacts

of ADIs on nutrition or stating impacts

are not necessarily positive but without

specifying impacts are negative. It

appears that studies documenting

specically the negative impacts of ADIs

on nutrition were scarce and relatively

old (e.g. those published by Von Braun

and Kennedy 1986; 1994). For example,

despite a number of studies highlighting

the limitations of biofortication and

questioning its relevance as a “silver bullet

solution” compared to dietary diversity

(e.g., Keatinge et al. 2011; Brooks 2010,

Kimura 2013), it has been dicult to

nd references clearly showing negative

impacts on nutrition. Consequently,

articles revealing negative links between

agriculture and certain key variables

for nutrition were also taken into

consideration, even though the impact

pathways did not extend all the way to

nutrition. We then included references

presenting negative impacts of ADIs on