Food Sovereignty: putting farmers back in control
harvesting in the Jaffna Peninsular, photo by Priyanthi Fernando Colombo’s Mayor, Rosy Senanayake, has cautioned that Colombo might run out of food by September. The Prime Minister has warned that we Sri Lankans will not be able to eat three meals a day for too long. Meanwhile Colombo clubs continue their invites for Special Mongolian dinner nights, traditional yellow rice Sunday lunches and weekend starter breakfasts and a leading local cosmetic firm launches a skin care product for all women in Sri Lanka using our heirloom rice as their main ingredient! Thinking about these contradictions, the impending food shortages, attendant malnutrition and starvation possibly for the first time in Sri Lanka, I am struck by a global news item that says that Africa could also be facing the spectre of famine, not because of droughts, or failed harvests or conflicts or bad national policy decisions within the continent, but because of the Russia-Ukraine war. The threat is so real that the h