1. Introduction
Lebanon faces a profound and compounding food crisis. According to the latest Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) – an initiative comprised of 21 organizations and intergovernmental institutions to jointly classify the severity and magnitude of food insecurity and malnutrition – 1.26 million people in Lebanon are currently in crisis phase (IPC Phase 3), of whom 85,000 are in emergency phase (IPC Phase 4). This indicates an urgent need for humanitarian action. Syrian and Palestinian refugees are disproportionately affected, with 34% and 45%, respectively, in Phase 3 and above. The United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and World Food Program (WFP) now consider Lebanon a “very high concern” hotspot for food insecurity, due to conflict escalation, displacement, and economic deterioration.
The roots of this crisis are neither recent nor simply economic. They are entrenched in political legacies of colonial governance, neoliberal reforms, and a state structure that has repeatedly failed to support rural and agriculture development, persistently privileging an export-oriented agriculture sector over local needs. The obstacles impeding Lebanon’s path toward food sovereignty are shared across many states in the Global South: years of financial mismanagement and extractive developmental schemes that benefit a tiny local moneyed elite and global financial actors; physical challenges, such as the increased stress of climate change on local agricultural practices in the form of heat waves and droughts; and administrative and political blocks to major land reform that could democratize local farming.
Over the past half-century, local policy makers, international experts, and major food business representatives molded Lebanon’s food system into one largely dependent on food imports for everyday consumption, while centering the agricultural sector on export-oriented products. These circumstances have undermined the food system’s ability to withstand financial, climate, and political shocks, subsequently diminishing the autonomy, livelihood, and political power of local growers. Furthermore, over the last two decades, Lebanon has witnessed the harms of climate change and a rise in temperatures, with fires, droughts, and dust storms becoming common occurrences. Lebanon is also located in a geopolitically tenuous region. To its South lies an ever-expansionist, intransigent, and militarized Israel whose latest war against the country decimated the urban fabric of its southern districts, killed thousands of people, and irreparably harmed thousands of acres of farming land in Lebanon’s fertile valleys to the East and South. Israeli actions have also repeatedly threatened Lebanon’s water security. Lastly, Lebanon is yet to emerge from a six-year financial crisis brought on by its kleptocratic political class, and which has decimated the middle and working classes, diluted their purchasing power, and made them more dependent on imports for sustenance.
At the same time, in response to deepening precarity, food sovereignty initiatives and grassroots movements are emerging in Lebanon – as they are globally – to try to retain control over food systems through resistance, innovation, and advocacy. This study highlights the difficulties facing farmers and food sovereignty activists in organizing a coherent and influential political bloc, due to fragmented efforts, structural political obstacles, limited resources, and a lack of institutional support. A particular focus is placed on governance and accountability mechanisms, both within the Lebanese government and among international financial institutions and other key stakeholders. Attention is given to the availability and transparency of information on food-related projects and initiatives, as well as the roles and responsibilities of different actors in shaping policy and implementation.
The research argues that a food-sovereign system that centers local producers is internally self-sufficient, provides dignified wages for farmers, satisfies local market needs, and is durable and adaptable to climate change – imperative for food security. To make progress on food sovereignty, farmers, advocacy groups across the political spectrum, as well as experts, educators, and civil society organizations must organize at the local, municipal, national, and regional levels into an effective political block capable of challenging the status quo, forcing their demands on the state, and ensuring the sovereignty of farmers. Moving beyond food security toward food sovereignty, Lebanon must invest in land reform, support grassroots cooperatives, and resist donor-driven input models. Only by returning power to producers and communities can the country build an adaptive, robust, just, and sovereign food system.
2. Methodology
Several guiding questions frame this inquiry: Who benefits from Lebanon’s current food policies and systems, and who is marginalized or excluded? What regions, sectors, or groups are most vulnerable to food insecurity under the present conditions? To what extent are civil society organizations (CSOs), unions, and local communities involved in shaping food policies, and who is excluded from these processes? When CSOs are included, what forms do their participation take, and what are the tangible impacts – both positive and unintended – of their involvement?
The first component of the research involved an extensive desk review, with a focus on three key dimensions in the literature on food sovereignty in Lebanon: the financial implications of food insecurity, the uneven distribution of food access, and the vulnerabilities facing certain social groups. The review also examines how these issues intersect with broader questions of governance, rights, and sustainability.
The primary research incorporates a qualitative component involving individual and group interviews, as well as field observations with a range of key stakeholders: farmers, policymakers, civil society actors, activists, and representatives from international organizations. The aim of the interview component was to gather firsthand accounts and experiential knowledge of the challenges and dynamics shaping Lebanon’s food systems today. Interviews were conducted with 15 individuals pooled from several segments invested in the issue of food sovereignty and security in Lebanon: local producers, CSO representatives, farmers’ advocates and organizers, and scholars and experts on the agricultural sector and political economy of food production and consumption.
The researcher also participated in consultation meetings and roundtable discussions – spaces that allowed for deeper dialogue and an exchange of ideas among stakeholders from diverse sectors, fostering collective reflection on pathways towards food sovereignty. Except for local experts who consented to using their names, the remaining interviewees have been anonymized. Additional information about interviewee selection and interview questions can be found in the Appendix.
The views represented in this paper are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Arab Reform Initiative, its staff, or its board.
