Quora Answer: What Will Singapore Do in a Global Food Crisis?

The following is my answer to a Quora question: “What will Singapore do if the global food crisis occurs and no country is able to export food because their government must prioritise domestic needs first?” 

Singapore is one of the countries that put a lot of effort and funding into securing our food security.  This is part of our preparation for climate change, which is projected to affect agricultural yields in key farming regions.  To that end, we have adopted what is essentially a two-pronged strategy. 

The first is to boost domestic agricultural production utilising technology.  Singapore is developing a domestic capability to grow many varieties vegetables through hydroponics and other means, in multi-storey factories with fill climate control.  We are also heavily invested in aquaculture, and other forms of farming such as domestic chicken egg production. 

The second is to secure supplies overseas by buying up farming land in countries which have a surplus, such as Australia, and parts of Africa.  The production is solely for Singapore’s consumption, and helps keep prices manageable and stave off food inflation. 

At the moment, we are far off from any form of global food crisis.  World produces enough food to feed several billion more people than there are on the planet.  We do not suffer from a lack of food.  Food shortages occur due to intentional scarcity to maintain prices, or because of supply chain issues.