Malaysia's Food Security

Yesterday in Kuala Lumpur, there was a march and protest by farmers and food producers throughout Malaysia. I think some 48 different organizations participated in it to highlight the crucial vital importance of food producers to Malaysia's food security, food sovereignty, and survival, particularly given the fact that Malaysia, like every other country in the world, is facing an unprecedented food crisis over the next several months and potentially years. This is an incredibly serious issue. And I just wonder if people think that the food just appears on the grocery shelves out of nowhere or that it's somehow produced in the grocery store. If you don't have farmers, if farmers don't have land, they can't produce the food that you buy at the supermarket.

If fishermen don't have access to the waters or if fishing waters have been depleted because of development projects like the Penang South reclamation project, there will be no fish to eat. If your food security is disproportionately dependent on imports from other countries or from major agribusiness corporations that are not from your country, that is the definition of food insecurity or a loss of food sovereignty. Farmers in Pera are facing mass evictions. There has been land grabbing, loss of agricultural land at a time when Malaysia and every other country in the world needs more domestic food production. I've been talking about this for some time.

We are undergoing a process of deglobalization. That means that every country is going to have to become more and more self reliant. You cannot be self reliant if your country cannot produce enough food for the people in your country to eat. This is just such basic common sense logic that it's astonishing that anyone has to say it. And you have to understand that trade in food internationally is not intended to help you feed your population.

It is intended to ensure that you cannot feed your population without reliance and dependence upon outsiders. That's how it works. This is why, for example, in many countries, you have domestic crops that are going to waste because the government has made trade agreements to purchase those same crops from another country, or you have crops that are grown in your country that have been slated for export, leaving your own population without those products. This is the most important issue that any country faces, being able to feed the population, and that issue is going to become only more and more important over the next several months and potentially years. When agricultural farmers, fish farmers, those who raise cattle, and food producers throughout Malaysia are marching to the parliament, don't think for a second that they're doing it for their own sake and for their own benefit.

This is for the benefit of everyone who eats. So everyone who eats should stand in solidarity with the food producers of Malaysia. And don't think for a second, well, if we can't produce, then we'll get it from somewhere else. That makes you dependent, that makes you reliant, and that will inevitably make you subservient. When you lose food sovereignty as a nation, whether it's because you have sacrificed it, surrendered it, or sabotaged it, when you have lost your food sovereignty, you will inevitably lose your political sovereignty.