A workshop is being held in Trinidad and Tobago to help Caribbean countries improve how they measure and understand food security and nutrition.
The event brings together statisticians, agriculture experts, and representatives from the CARICOM Secretariat, the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), ministries, and other regional and international bodies. It lasts for a week and is run by CARICOM and the FAO.
The main goals of the workshop are:
- Helping countries use their own national data to estimate levels of food security and the cost of healthy diets.
- Adding this data to systems that monitor food prices.
The workshop comes at a time when Caribbean countries are working to reduce how much food they import. It also fits with a global focus on improving food security and nutrition.
Mr. Halim Brizan, who leads CARICOM’s Regional Statistics Programme, said the rising cost of food was a key reason for organizing the workshop. He also mentioned other serious challenges affecting the region, such as climate change, problems in global supply chains, economic struggles, and health emergencies.
Mr. Brizan explained that food security is about more than just having food. It includes four areas: whether food is available, whether people can access it, how it is used, and how stable the supply is.
The workshop mainly focuses on:
- Measuring food access using the Food Insecurity Experience Scale (FIES).
- Calculating the cost and affordability of a healthy diet.
- Evaluating diet quality using the Diet Quality Questionnaire (DQQ).
He stressed that just having access to food is not enough. It’s also important to look at whether people are eating healthy diets.
Brizan said it’s important for different national offices and agencies to keep working together to build good statistical systems. These systems can help monitor the cost of healthy food and show the bigger picture behind food insecurity.
This workshop is part of a special CARICOM year dedicated to statistics, with the theme: “Improving lives through statistics; strengthening and innovating together.”
Source: CARICOM.
