Department of Human, Ecology, University of California, Davis, CA, United States of America.
International Food Policy Research Institute, Washington, DC, United States of America.
PLoS One. 2022 Jun 15;17(6):e0269891. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0269891. eCollection 2022.
While global food trade has allowed countries to buffer against domestic food production shortfalls and gain access to larger markets, engaging in trade has also opened economies up to shocks and increased extraction of food resources. With this research, we analyze how the global grain network influences country-level nourishment, while controlling for per capita land and food production. First, we model the trade network structure of the global wheat supply chain to measure the centrality or positionality of countries. We use spatial regression analysis to assess the impact of trade networks, volume, purchasing power, production capacity and geography on undernourishment. We find that the six countries most central to the global grain trade by betweenness and eigenvector centralities account for more than half of all wheat exports globally by volume. The centrality of these countries as opposed to volume of wheat produced or traded, determines their influence in the wheat supply chain network. The parametric component of our analysis confirms that trade, and centrality have significant implications for national levels of nourishment. Our findings suggest that for countries with low purchasing power, increasing centrality allows improvements in nourishment levels but for countries with very high purchasing power, increasing centrality can increase hunger outcomes. To counteract perturbations and shortfalls such as those being experienced currently in the globalized food system, local and regional governments may consider refocusing on regional and local based food systems.
虽然全球食品贸易使各国能够缓冲国内粮食生产短缺，并进入更大的市场，但参与贸易也使经济面临冲击，并增加了对粮食资源的开采。本研究通过控制人均土地和粮食产量，分析了全球粮食网络如何影响国家层面的营养状况。首先，我们构建了全球小麦供应链的贸易网络结构模型，以衡量各国的中心度或位置度。我们采用空间回归分析评估了贸易网络、贸易量、购买力、产能和地理位置对营养不足的影响。研究发现，在全球粮食贸易中基于介数中心度和特征向量中心度最具中心地位的六个国家，其小麦出口量占全球小麦出口总量的一半以上。这些国家的中心地位，而不是其小麦产量或交易量，决定了它们在全球小麦供应链网络中的影响力。分析的参数部分证实，贸易和中心地位对国家营养水平有重要影响。研究结果表明，对于购买力较低的国家，提高中心度可以改善营养水平，但对于购买力非常高的国家，提高中心度可能会导致饥饿加剧。为了应对当前全球化食品系统中出现的波动和短缺，地方和区域政府可能会考虑重新关注基于区域和本地的食品系统。
