Background
Methods
Study design and setting
Sample and recruitment
Interview guide development
• Can you tell me about your current work? • Health care, free speech or living a life free from discrimination are the rights of every Australian, regardless of their income, location or any other factor. Do you think that food is somehow different to these otherwise “universal” requirements? • What comes to mind when I say the term “the human right to food”? • In Australia, have you heard this term used widely? • Do you use it? If so, when and in what circumstances? • In your opining, is the ‘human right to food’ a helpful concept, even when it is not enforceable like civil and political rights are? • Imagining that every Australian is able to eat well - we have achieved a “human right to food” – just like free speech for example. • What is the government doing in this best-case scenario? • What are not-for-profit organisations doing? • What role do other major players have? For example, the food industry, research and tertiary sector, legal institutions, citizens. • Are there other important players, for example international actors? • Thinking of barriers now. What do you think are the road blocks to achieving this vision of a human right to food in Australia? • Now thinking of the enablers or opportunities for change. What current opportunities (such as frameworks, strategies or activities) are in place now to support achieving a human right to food in Australia in the future? • What’s working? What do we need to keep? Have you seen best practice internationally? |
Data collection
Data analysis
Results
Frequency (n = 30) | Percentage (%) | |
---|---|---|
Current employment | ||
Academic | 16 | 53 |
Non-Government | 8 | 27 |
State Government | 5 | 17 |
Local Government | 1 | 3 |
Current role | ||
Senior Leadership | 7 | 23 |
Practitioner | 9 | 30 |
Senior Academia | 5 | 17 |
Early-mid Career Academia | 9 | 30 |
Years of relevant experience | ||
10–14 | 12 | 40 |
15–19 | 7 | 23 |
20–29 | 5 | 17 |
30+ | 5 | 17 |
Unassigned | 1 | 3 |
State/Territory of Employment | ||
Victoria | 12 | 40 |
New South Wales | 5 | 17 |
Queensland | 5 | 17 |
Western Australia | 4 | 13 |
Tasmania | 3 | 10 |
South Australia | 1 | 3 |
Northern Territory | 0 | 0 |
Australian Capital Territory | 0 | 0 |
The problem stream
Framing food insecurity within human rights terminology is effective when communicating with some audiences
The term human right to food was described as being somewhat utopian, in terms of making food security a legislated issue, and therefore of limited usefulness to achieve real-world progress. Participants suggested alternative terminology to engage specific audiences. Some participants advised that based on evidence about values-based communication, terms such as ‘deserves’ and ‘fairness’ are more effective than ‘rights’ in engaging everyday people. Participants who described these terms, did so within the context of reflecting Australian values whereby every living human in Australia ‘deserves’ access to adequate food to maintain a healthy life. In order to gain traction, civil organisations and individuals must be empowered to advocate and to do so, the issue must be framed with more publicly palatable language. The right to food framing may be helpful in engaging policymakers, academics and legal audiences, however to engage community members terms such as ‘food sovereignty’ in response to issues of ‘food stress’, ‘poverty’, ‘cost-of living’ are, according to interviewees, more effective.“I think maybe human rights is used by some as, I don't know, a lefty agenda and it has become a bit polarised in that way.” (Academic, Senior Academic, 30 years)
Human rights language presents a novel framing for the public health workforce; however, progress is required to define this approach and ensure accountability
There is also work to be done to define what the ‘right to food’ actually looks like in practice. Participants described the importance of food meeting specific cultural needs and reinforced that when individuals are required to source their food from emergency relief services, their human right to food is not being fulfilled.“We would need to see a Food Security Act from the Commonwealth Government and that would mean that if a person in Australia didn’t have food security they would have a potential remedy or an enforceable right, whereas now it is just an aspirational right.” (State Government, Practitioner, 20 years)
The term ‘human right to food’ is seldom used in the public health rhetoric
Participants advised that in Australia’s current neoliberal political climate, policymakers are not prioritising the protection of rights, unless it’s framed within the 2030 sustainable development and attributed to targets that have already been committed to. Participants suggest that training and support is required to ensure its utilisation is effective and appropriately targeted to specific audiences, as human rights terminology is not part of traditional training across these sectors. In building workforce capacity, training must link human rights to existing policy agendas and explain current legislative accountability.“This is not the language of practical or practitioner policymakers, the rights-based language – we’re not using it. We’re talking about a sustainable development goal [instead]” (State Government, Senior Leadership, 32 years)
Most participants agreed that the human rights discourse adds importance to the issue of food insecurity, and that such language and the associated frameworks, could amplify public health advocacy efforts.“I think we’ve got to start slipping it into conversation rather than marching forward with banners, if you know what I mean” (Academic, Early-Mid Career Academia, 17 years)
The policy stream
Government
“We need some type of blueprint that the governments at each level have committed to…. Centrelink payments … Newstart payments, so that needs to be increased.” (Academic, Early-Mid Career Academia, 10-14 years).
Food industry
Some participants envisaged supermarkets amending their logistics systems to ensure there was no surplus food being redistributed to the charitable food sector. The role of supermarkets in ensuring fair food prices for Australian farmers was discussed by two participants, for example, ensuring farmer contracts supported their livelihoods. Importantly, in remote communities, food outlets would be run as a community service rather than maximising profitability."We would need legislative provisions that stopped food corporations from selling unhealthy products and behaving in a way that compromises full food security in the pursuit of profits for shareholders." (Academic, Early-Mid Career Academia, 10–14 years)
Not-for-profit sector
Other respondents described a truly unified and collaborative sector where all programs had a human rights lens, while others still outlined a successful social entrepreneurship approach that accounted for various contexts.“Providing them with access to on the ground experiences that people are facing. Often they’re quite good at translating these real-life stories to policy makers … they have a great role there in ensuring that any policy that’s being decided upon …is going to be as impactful as possible.” (Academic, Senior Academia, 15-19 years).
Research and tertiary sector
“Universities are too slow… sharing that data that’s been gathered in a really rigorous way in a more timely manner for practitioners and policymakers.” (Non-government, Senior Leadership, 20–29 years)
Legal institutions
“I’m sure that legal people could be very helpful for us in terms of how you frame it and then advocacy … I think that if you want to change the paradigm, you’re gonna need advocates and they’re gonna need to be at all levels.” (State Government, Practitioner, 30+ years)
Citizens
“We need citizen groups to make sure that, that you know the good work is kept up. And legally, there should be, there should be legal consequences for people failing to live up to their, companies living up to their social contract.” (State Government, Senior Leadership, 15–19 years)
Other actors
“The philanthropic funders and the other – the funders who did a bit outside the square of government as well and how we bring them in ‘cause again, while we have well-intentioned providers, we also have well-intentioned funders.” (Non-government, Senior Leadership, 20–29 years)
The political stream
Barriers to achieving a human right to food in Australia
Private sector profits are being prioritised. Given the government’s focus on individual responsibility, the ‘onslaught’ of cheap, processed food by an industrialised food industry reportedly led to “default purchases” of unhealthy food with limited regulation. Numerous respondents described the issue of farmers paid too little, or contractually obliged to only sell to the major supermarkets, and in the situation where such supermarkets wouldn’t take the produce, it was wasted, i.e.:“We’re not monitoring it using an appropriate measure, we’re not monitoring it consistently, we’re underestimating it, we’re saying it’s not such a big problem, so let’s brush it under the rug. So, that is one of the biggest barriers, the fact that we just, we don’t want to know” (Academic, Early-Mid Career Academia, 10-14 years).
Some respondents believed we have sufficient information to advance a right to food, but political will and domestic laws to protect this right, are lacking. The neoliberal, individualistic ideology of government was reinforced by many respondents, with food “seen as a consumer product rather than a public service” in the current deregulated environment. Other commentary focused on Australia’s reductionist society. One respondent described local government as having “their hands tied by state policy”, citing challenges to restrict fast food. Policy changes to several government programs including the community development program, resulted in remote community members “missing out on income” due to changing regulations, impacting their ability to purchase food. The lack of enforceable human rights law was consistently described by participants as highly problematic, i.e.:“The absolute power they have over our food systems … the distribution chain and the farmers and how much they are controlled by what major supermarkets demand of them and I think if they changed their value set then we would be in a really, really different place.” (State Government, Practitioner, 10–14 years)
The existing charitable food sector was described as inefficient and ineffective. Service duplication and a siloed working approach in a “corporatised” charitable food sector was criticised by some interviewees, as was the pushing of organisations’ agendas on service recipients. The unsustainable model of distributing donated food was discussed; resources were described as “stretched” with organisations lacking time to explore other solutions to the current model that would improve livelihoods long term, i.e.:“No one has got a right to food security…if I was on welfare and they put me on the cashless welfare card up in the Northern Territory, I can’t take the minister for social security to court and say this breeches my right to food security because they would go oh yes, and what right is that, what right is being breeched, you show me the Act of parliament… I’d just have to point to international law and that’s not an enforceable right” (Academic, Early-Mid Career Academia, 10+ years)
“We're at risk of just creating this big machine that feeds insecure people and doesn't have any mechanisms in which to actually reduce how many people are food insecure.” (Non-government, Practitioner, 15–19 years)
Enablers and opportunities for achieving a human right to food in Australia
Integrating human rights further into government frameworks and community projects is possible. Some interviewees suggested incorporating human rights language into existing strategies, such as the National Obesity Strategy or proposed new National Preventive Health Strategy, given the alignment between issues. Successful community-based approaches were described within a broader approach as empowering community members and required longer term investment, i.e.:“There’s real opportunities to develop really clear strong messages for government and also to really work on what are the key research questions… I feel like there’s a potential to really harness a group, that a contingency, that are working more and more together” (Academic, Early-Mid Career Academia, 20-29 years).
Capitalising on the acceptance and action on the Sustainable Development Goals was also perceived as important, with human rights approaches rather than the terminology being adopted into such action. A more recent focus on sustainable economy strategies was perceived as having potential to create dignified opportunities to feed vulnerable Australians. “Localised food systems” were increasing in popularity, as were food alliances and Food Policy Councils which had seen cross-sector collaboration to address food system issues. These governance strategies were “mechanisms for collaboration”, i.e.:“I think community food co-operatives are probably something that is going to get more attention because of the combined effect of [the] bushfires and Coronavirus, so perhaps there’s scope for expanding local or state government support for, for local food co-ops.” (Academic, Early-Mid Career Academia, 10–14 years)
“If we can integrate all of these projects and these bodies and we can take a holistic and systemic approach, then we're in a really good place to really begin to mainstream food poverty as an issue and to start to look at what we need to do to really alleviate it.” (Non-government, Practitioner, 14-19 years).
Policy windows
Strategy | Australian example | International example |
---|---|---|
Social welfare advocacy or policy | • Raise the Rate (Newstart) • Right to Food Coalition (National) | • Norway • Sweden • School Lunch Program (Japan) • Basic Pension Policy (New Zealand) • Canada – Paddock to Plate (British Columbia) • National Food Policy (Brazil) • Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) program (USA) • Right to Food Scotland Bill (Scotland) |
Legal frameworks | • Charter of Human Rights (Victoria) | |
Community-led approaches | • Remote food symposium (Northern Territory) | • Food Lab Detroit (USA) • Vibrant Communities (Canada) • Incredible Edible (UK) |
Food distribution platforms and models | • Open Food Network (National) • Asylum Seeker Resource Centre Food Justice Truck (Victoria) • Melbourne ‘pay as you feel’ restaurants (Victoria) | • The Stop (Canada) • Food Hubs (USA) • Food growing on urban building roofs (France) |
Political entrepreneurs
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Government representatives such as Members of Parliament, Local Government Councillors or employees could advocate within parliament to advance policy actions.
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Not-for-profit sector staff such as charitable organisation staff or volunteers could act as connectors between government and community, representing and advocating for community needs.
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Tertiary sector staff such as researchers could be used to publish research on how the problem of food insecurity could be best framed for maximum impact, and lecturers could include human rights-based approaches in their tertiary education courses.
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Legal professionals such as lawyers could support other sector stakeholders to frame food security using correct human rights language and aid its integration into constitutional rights.
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Citizens are urged to hold the government to account
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Public health practitioners could utilise human rights language if engaging in food security advocacy.
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The media could similarly adopt human rights language in conveying food security information.
Discussion
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At the current time advocates should use human rights language with caution, considering using more engaging terms such as ‘deserve’ and ‘fairness’ within the Australian context. An approach likely to be more successful is to anchor advocacy efforts within the 2030 Agenda/Sustainable Development Goals, which are already politically palatable.
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Workers across sectors should consider assuming the roles suggested by this study in their practice and policy endeavours.
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All actors should continue to apply pressure to the government to adequately and regularly measure food insecurity in Australia in order to better understand the true scale of the issue and advance advocacy efforts to address it.
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Sectors should incorporate human rights strategies and principles (even if not labelled as ‘human rights approaches’) into plans and frameworks to ensure equitable access to affordable, nutritious food.