FAO estimated in 1993/94 that 13 percent of
Bhutanese households were chronically food
insecure and 16 percent had transitory or
seasonal food insecurity. The analysis provided
by FAO’s 1993/94 Comprehensive Food
Security Programme (CFSP) identified the
following four vulnerable or food insecure
groups:
¾ people in remote areas who depend on their
own production of field crops. These include
the sub-tropical maize producers, the cold
temperate cereal producers, the high
altitude communities and the high altitude
pastoralists;
¾ share croppers, including those with no land
of their own, or only owning part of the land
they operate;
¾ the landless, including low wage workers,
road maintenance and forest workers, self
employed craftsmen, petty traders,
seasonal agricultural workers and herders;
and
¾ the urban unemployed and school dropouts.
A recent survey indicates that as many as 56
percent of the rural households face transient
food insecurity. The paper identifies and
highlights the strategies, both existing and
planned, to improve access to food in Bhutan.