Vol.63 No.3

2023（No.449）［Abstracts］

Food Insecurities in Egypt:with special reference to dependency, vulnerabilities
and food subsidies
IDO Yuko＊＊ IWASAKI Erina＊
With key concepts of dependency and vulnerabilities, this paper analyzes food insecurities
in Egypt under Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi administration since June 2014 up to the aftermath of theCOVID-19 and the Ukraine Crisis. As one of the top wheat importers in the world, Egypt has
also been hit by the Black Sea blockade, since it had been heavily reliant on wheat import fromRussia and Ukraine. This paper clariﬁes how Sisiʼs Egypt has strengthened its dependency on
external debts to invest in extravagant megaprojects that are beyond its ﬁnancial repayment
capabilities and only beneﬁt limited parts of the population, especially military-related; mostof the vulnerable population, especially urban poor/lower-middle income families andindividuals have been left as most vulnerable to external shocks, while shrinking foodsubsidies and poor-targeted conditional cash transfer only remain as their limited tangible
safety nets.
＊Professor, Sophia University＊＊

AAIJ member

Junior Research Fellow, ILCAA,
Tokyo University of Foreign Studies― 92 ―

Food Insecurity in Lebanon amid Economic Crisis

TSUCHIYA Ichiki＊
This study examines the issue of food security in Lebanon since 2020, focusing on wheatand bread. As a result of economic crisis due to the devaluation of the local currency andinﬂation, many Lebanese citizens faced diﬃculties in purchasing food, leading to an increasein food insecurity among residents, including Syrian refugees. Russiaʼs invasion of Ukraine
further worsened the situation, as Lebanon heavily relies on wheat imports from the twocountries. The government attempted to address this issue by subsidizing wheat imports andregulating bread prices; however, these measures have been insuﬃcient due to the lack of foodsecurity policy as well as ﬁscal resources.
＊IDE-JETRO― 93 ―

Structural Challenges to Food Security in Tunisia

YAMANAKA Tatsuya＊This paper examines the structural issues about the food security in Tunisia and its
situation after 2020 in relation to domestic factors and global issues. The main causes ofcurrent political and economic crises in Tunisia are as follows.
After independence, Tunisia fell into dependence on imports of grains, feeds, and reﬁned
oil due to domestic low value-added industries, unstable employment, and a vulnerable
agricultural sector. Successive Tunisian governments have implemented various subsidy
policies to support the livelihood of people and to maintain their power while demonstrating
their legitimacy. This is the main reason for the chronic national budget deﬁcit.
However, because of the socio-economic turmoil following the 2011 "revolution",
Tunisia's tourism industry stagnated and immigrant remittances were also sluggish, resulting ina signiﬁcant decrease in foreign currency income. The COVID-19 pandemic and the war in
Ukraine have pushed up market prices for grains, feeds and energy. The war has also disrupted
logistics, then Tunisia has suﬀered from severe inﬂation.
Tunisia's natural and technological constraints and institutional deficiencies in foodproduction have resulted in low productivity and extremely low self-sufficiency. Moreover,worsening water risks due to climate change have increased the vulnerability of Tunisia's
agricultural sector, but overall export sophistication to finance food imports has yet to beachieved. Fiscal crises caused by multiple factors require even higher debt and unpopular
structural adjustments. It is a vicious circle that leads to food insecurity, riots and socioeconomic crises.
＊AAIJ member

Associate Professor, Komazawa University― 94 ―

Trajectories of Diverse Socialism in Central America and the Caribbean:
Focusing on the Sandinista National Liberation Front in Nicaragua
MATSUMOTO

Yaeko＊

During the Cold War, various socialist governments were established in Central America
and the Caribbean, and a number of these forces were active as major political parties up to thepresent oftentimes revised their political orientations. First, this study aimed to elucidate thediversity of these lefts and their characteristics. After a brief investigation on the academic
trends of comparative communism until the 1980s, the study examined three cases: anoverview of long-term changes in the one-party system of the Communist Party in Cuba,activities of the Dominican Revolutionary Party (PRD) and the Dominican Liberation Party(PLD) formed by Juan Bosch (who was ousted by the civil war in the Dominican Republic inthe 1960s), and democratic socialism developed by Michal Manley of Jamaica in the 1970s
and the subsequent trends of the Peopleʼs National Party (PNP).
Given this survey, we focused on Nicaragua to explain the transformation of Daniel
Ortegaʼs FSLN government into an authoritarian one after taking power in the fair election of2006. We raise two factors. First, the FSLN government was dependent on foreign support,such as ALBA, which was unable to fully maintain social policies since circa 2018 after failingto ﬁnd a new donor after the death of Hugo Chávez. Second, the Ortega-Alemán Pact and thesplit of the main opposition weakened the functions of political parties to aggregate andrepresent the interests of the people.
＊AAIJ member

Part-time Lecturer, Asia University― 95 ―