Food security as critical infrastructure: The importance of safeguarding the food supply for civil security

Abstract

Vulnerabilities in critical infrastructures can cause significant hardships to the affected population during crises and large scale disasters like Hurricane Sandy in 2012 or the nuclear catastrophic event Fukushima in 2011. Referring to this, critical infrastructures include “primary physical structures, technical facilities and systems whose disruption, failure or destruction have a serious impact on the functioning of society, the economy or the state within a natural hazard induced disaster context” (UNISDR 2011: 6). As a component of critical infrastructures, Food and especially the Food Supply is a significant part of the services for the public and fundamental for an effective Civil Security System. In this chapter primary definitions regarding Food as a critical infrastructure are depicted as the meaning of safeguarding the food supply in case of crisis or disaster situations emerges as critically important. Furthermore selected hazards and their impacts to the society are described.