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From Food Safety to Food Security: Two Essential Pillars of Human Dignity
Every year on June 7, the world observes World Food Safety Day. This occasion provides an opportunity to reflect on one of the most important issues related to health, human rights, and human dignity: food that is not only available, but also safe, nutritious, and fit for human consumption.
Within the United Nations system, two closely related but distinct concepts are often discussed and sometimes confused:
Food Safety refers to ensuring that food is free from harmful biological, chemical, and physical contaminants that may endanger human health. To raise awareness of this issue, the United Nations designates June 7 each year as World Food Safety Day.
In contrast, Food Security refers to reliable and sustainable access to sufficient, nutritious, and affordable food for all people. It means that no one should be deprived of food because of poverty, war, economic crises, or natural disasters. Unlike food safety, which has a dedicated international observance, food security is a broader and ongoing priority within the work of the United Nations and other international organizations. It receives particular attention during global initiatives and observances, including World Food Day on October 16.
These two concepts are deeply interconnected. An abundance of food that is unsafe cannot protect human health, just as safe food that remains inaccessible cannot eliminate hunger. Together, food safety and food security constitute two essential pillars of the right to food, public health, and human dignity.
According to the World Health Organization, approximately 600 million people—nearly one in ten globally—fall ill each year after consuming contaminated food, and around 420,000 people lose their lives as a result. Children under the age of five bear nearly 40 percent of the burden of foodborne diseases. At the same time, hundreds of millions of people around the world continue to face food insecurity, malnutrition, and hunger.
World Food Safety Day invites a shift in focus from the basic safety of food to a larger question: How can a world be built in which every human being has access not only to safe food, but also to sufficient food that upholds human dignity?
War, Siege, and the Most Vulnerable Communities
In many conflict-affected and besieged regions, food has become more than a basic human necessity; it has been transformed into a tool of pressure and control. Families living under such conditions often face not only food shortages but also a lack of safe and reliable food supplies.
Women, children, older persons, and people with disabilities bear the greatest burden. Malnutrition, weakened immune systems, increased vulnerability to disease, and impaired physical and cognitive development are among the direct consequences of these conditions.
Today, access to safe food and clean water remains one of the most urgent humanitarian challenges in many parts of the world. As long as millions of people are deprived of adequate and safe food because of war, siege, poverty, or systemic injustice, global justice remains incomplete.
Food Justice Between the Global North and South
World Food Safety Day also offers an opportunity to reflect on the profound inequalities that exist between the Global North and the Global South.
While millions of people in lower-income countries struggle with hunger, malnutrition, and food insecurity, a substantial portion of the world’s food production is lost or wasted every year. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) estimates that roughly one-third of all food produced globally is lost or wasted annually.
This reality raises an important ethical question: How can human dignity be invoked while one part of the world suffers from hunger and malnutrition and another part discards vast quantities of food?
Food justice is not merely about producing more food. It requires ensuring the fair distribution of resources, reducing food waste, supporting sustainable agriculture, protecting the environment, and guaranteeing access to safe and nutritious food for all.
Our Shared Responsibility
Food safety and food security are shared responsibilities. Governments, international organizations, food producers, researchers, educational institutions, and consumers all have a role to play.
Contributions can be made by:
- Reducing food waste;
- Properly storing and handling food;
- Supporting sustainable and responsible production;
- Promoting public awareness about food safety;
- Advocating for fair food policies;
- Supporting scientific research; and
- Standing in solidarity with communities affected by war and poverty.
Through these actions, a healthier, more sustainable, and more equitable food system can be established.
Safe and Secure Food as the Foundation of Human Dignity
At Roya Institute for Global Justice, it is maintained that both food safety and food security are inseparable from human rights, social justice, and human dignity. No society can achieve lasting peace, equitable development, or collective well-being unless all people have access to sufficient, safe, and nutritious food.
World Food Safety Day is more than a date on the calendar. It is a call for education, awareness, advocacy, and collective action toward a more just world—one in which no person is denied access to safe and adequate food because of poverty, war, or injustice.