Context

• Disruption of supply chains due to Ukraine war has implications for India’s food security

What is supply chain in simple words?

• A supply chain is the network of all the individuals, organizations, resources, activities and technology involved in the creation and sale of a product.

Is supply chain management related to agriculture?

• Agribusiness, supply chain management (SCM) implies managing the relationships between the businesses responsible for the efficient production and supply of products from the farm level to the consumers to meet consumers’ requirements reliably in terms of quantity, quality and price.

What are two types of food chain?

• Agriculture food supply chains for fresh agricultural products: (such as fresh vegetables, flowers, fruit). In general, these chains may comprise growers, auctions, wholesalers, importers and exporters, retailers and speciality shops and their input and service suppliers. Basically, all of these stages leave the intrinsic characteristics of the product grown or produced untouched. The main processes are the handling, conditioned storing, packing, transportation and especially trading of these goods.
• Agriculture food supply chains for processed food products: (such as portioned meats, snacks, juices, desserts, canned food products). In these chains, agricultural products are used as raw materials for producing consumer products with higher added value. In most cases, conservation and conditioning processes extend the shelf-life of the products.

Supply chain issues

• Shelf-life constraints for raw materials, intermediates and finished products and changes in product quality level while progressing the supply chain (decay).
• High volume, low variety (although the variety is increasing) production systems.
• Importance of production planning and scheduling focusing on high capacity utilization.
• Highly sophisticated capital-intensive machinery leading to the need to maintain capacity utilization.
• Variable process yield in quantity and quality due to biological variations, seasonality, random factors connected with weather, pests and other biological hazards.

What should we do to ensure nutritional security?

• Strengthening and shortening food supply chains: reinforcing regional food systems, food processing, agricultural resilience and sustainability in a climate-changing world will require prioritising research and investments along these lines.
• Infrastructure: Lastly, infrastructure and institutions supporting producers, agripreneurs and agricultural micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) in their production value chain are central to the transition.
• Potential for crop diversification: Data compiled in the agro-climatic zones reports of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research and the erstwhile Planning Commission of India reveal enormous potential for crop diversification and precision for enhanced crop productivity based on soil type, climate (temperature and rainfall), and captive water resources.
• Holistic policy approach: In the context of the intensifying economic, environmental and climate challenges and crisis, the need of the hour is a good theory of transition encompassing the spatial, social and scientific dimensions, supported by policy incentives and mechanisms for achieving a sustainable, resilient and food secure agriculture.
• Agro-climatic approach: An agro-climatic approach to agricultural development is important for sustainability and better nutrition.

Way forward

• Transparency: The Indian government could ensure more transparency on food stocks and regulate the private sector.
• Set restriction on hoarding: For that, there is a need to set restrictions on the reserves that the private sector can hold, as they often tend to hoard food stocks to later sell at a profit.
• Speculation should be regulated: This will help prevent the opaqueness of private sector reserves, which often fuels speculation by large international financial actors.
• Positional limits: Internationally, positional limits could be set on speculators but that would require a multilateral accord, a topic which should be on the agenda at the next G-20 meeting.

Mains question

Q. What role supply chain play in nutritional security? Discuss the constraints in supply chain along with way forward.

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