Natural disasters and food crises in low-income countries: Macroeconomic dimensions

This paper provides a framework for assessing a country’s vulnerability to food crisis in the event of natural disasters. Macroeconomic and structural indicators that are crucial for ensuring the resilience of low-income countries to adverse external shocks are equally important for minimizing the occurrence of food crisis in the event of natural disasters.

Results show the probability of experiencing a food crisis increases for countries with weaker institutions and low food supply per capita growth trend. Fragile States are found to be more prone to food crises episodes. This paper fills a very important gap in the literature, by focusing on the potential role that the availability of macroeconomic buffers could play in limiting the occurrence of food crisis associated with natural disasters.