Box 4.

Covid-19, seed security and social differentiation

For the poor, covid -19 represents yet another uncertainty. Society’s poorest are commonly considered the least food secure, facing high vulnerability and low resilience, as is also described in relation to climate change and its interacting factors (Kaijser and Kronsell 2014). The concept of intersectionality highlights that the poorest are often disadvantaged across a number of interacting social dimensions (ibid), subjecting them to different mechanisms of marginalization and clusters of interlocking disadvantages (Cleaver 2005). Women are disproportionately afflicted because they typically make up more than half of this fraction of society.

Seed security directly determines food security for many smallholder farmers in developing countries (McGuire and Sperling 2011). Saving one’s own seed for the next sowing is the most common seed sourcing practice of smallholder farmers across the majority of food crops. At first thought one may expect self-provisioning of seed to be a relatively covid-19 tolerant practice – which justifies advice to stimulate seed saving practices. However, for the poorest smallholders, food and seed security are also closely intertwined in another way: because usually food production falls short of household consumption demands and cash constraints are pressing, next year’s seed is at risk of being eaten or sold outright. This explains why many of the poorest farmers end up sourcing seed from neighbours, family, or local markets when planting time arrives (e.g. Tadesse et al. 2016). Saving one’s own seed is a practice that only the better-off in the community can afford. It is also often assumed that covid -19- related disruptions in food production, seed security, and other livelihood impacts, would increase people’s reliance on social networks. If this were the case, the poorest would again face a disadvantage. In addition to acting as safety nets, social ties also represent a set of social obligations which are often restrictive (Cleaver 2005); and this applies too for seed sourcing (Coomes et al. 2015). Off-farm income generation (e.g. day labour, local construction jobs, seasonal migrant labour, and remittances) are important lifelines for many of the poorest. The impact of covid-19 on these sources of income will disproportionately affect the poor.