Flirting with food security: resilience in the face of conflict, climate change and communicable disease in rural Sierra Leone

The term ‘vulnerability’ is indubitably linked to this conceptualization of food security. Anderson (1995: 41) asserts that, ‘to be vulnerable is to exist with a likelihood that some kind of crisis may occur that will damage one’s health, life, or the property and resources upon which health and life depend’. Given that food is one of the key resources upon which health and life depend, crises threatening its availability, accessibility or utilization, perhaps elicit the most critical manifestation of vulnerability, while food insecurity perpetuates and exacerbates vulnerability, in and of itself. Thus, as Lovendal and Knowles (2006) argue, reducing vulnerability is of critical importance when addressing the issue of food security.