ABSTRACT
Food security has been defined as access to both adequate and healthy food. In the global North diet may be adequate but unhealthy, leading to obesity; whereas in the South inadequate nutrition may occur. These different manifestations of food insecurity have their roots in economic, social, and political conditions. Geospatial technology offers means of both measuring and even predicting these forms of food insecurity. In the South, remote sensing and mapping of socio-economic trends at a national level may be appropriate. Finer-level small area data may be unobtainable in the South, but is useful for identifying local areas of Northern food insecurity (obesity) that may occur physically close to prosperous food-secure districts. The problem with geospatial technology and food insecurity may be a surfeit of data in multiple formats, hiding true causal linkages among many spurious correlations and false dichotomies caused by artificial areal boundaries. This chapter suggests a methodology for drilling deeper into correlations and eliciting hidden true connections between social conditions and food insecurity. Ultimately, however, geospatial technologists must accept that they are not politicians or international peacekeepers; their research can lead to policy recommendations, but not necessarily to the implementation of those policies.
