Question

Using chapter 6 and the FAO articles for this week pretend you are working at the United Nations conducting meetings with other countries on food security, suggest ideas for improving the food system using any theory from this week's chapter. In other words, how can you apply any cultural values theory/pattern to improve the food system?

Read the following chapter from the class text by Samovar, Porter, McDaniel and Roy, 2017

Chapter 6: Values and Culture: Pages 199-240

Videos of the week

These videos supplement the chapter on values and culture. For instance as it relates to Hofstede cultural dimensions, we learn that Hofstede has listed key values that describes the world. More importantly, he categorizes the world according to these values. This helps us to group countries that are similar in values and identify countries that have very distinct values. This proves important in daily intercultural interactions to higher level international meetings, negotiations and travel. In such events we can begin to build on similarities and ensure we are respectful to differences. For instance if you are from a low power distance culture and you are going to work in a high power distance culture, you should expect that decisions are made by managers and that you will not be asked to give your opinion on a project. As it relates, to high and low context cultures, a better understanding of these concepts helps intercultural communication to flow better. For instance, if you are from a low context culture and you are in a class with students from a high context culture, you will understand and respect the fact that silence for the high context students equates to a great level of manners and wisdom. Similarly, they will understand that you value being opinionated and expressing yourselves with words because your diverse societies teaches you that words are needed for all backgrounds to understand the situation.

Click on Hofstede cultural dimensions

Click on high and low context cultures

Articles for the week

These articles underscore the importance of values and culture by focusing on the food system and agriculture. We learned a few weeks ago that our food system is very fragile right now. We have food wastage and food shortage occurring simultaneously as well as famine and obesity occurring simultaneously. Many parts of the world currently has no access to food and millions are starving everyday. Other parts of the world has the wrong access to food , meaning they are not able to access the recommended amount of  fruits and vegetables daily. Such unhealthy diets contributes to chronic diseases like diabetes type 2. We need to find ways to produce food in more sustainable , environmentally friendly ways, distribute food more equally to all communities and educate the population on the benefits of a healthful diet. Culture, values and intercultural communication can play a role in each of these steps. Intercultural communication is obvious as we need to communicate with farmers globally on implementing and adding new sustainable agricultural practices. Values and cultures becomes important when we learn to appreciate and respect diversity in foods and agricultural practices. Promoting the food and agricultural values of all cultures ensures and safeguards measures for producing and distributing a steady supply of diverse food in local communities. This in turn helps to support food security for more of the world's population, helping us to achieve the zero hunger SDG by 2030.

Click on food and agriculture

Click on food and agriculture part 2

Chapter 6: Values and culture explanation

Another area that we need to respect and understand are people’s values. A value informs a culture to what is good or bad, right or wrong, appropriate or inappropriate and these theories in chapter 6 helps us to categorize predominant values across cultures. First it is important for you to remember Kohl’s theory on American values. He outlines the values we as Americans practice and believe in such as being competitive ( this refers to good competition to keep striving to be better for instance we have number 1 cars, hospitals, we constantly rate things and so on), futuristic ( we make some of the world’s most innovative technology), practical ( we prefer to get to the point and not waste time, since we consider time to be a precious commodity as we are always on a deadline) and so on.

Kluckhon says that all cultures ask these 5 questions but answer them in different ways. For instance, as it relates to time, some cultures value the past more, some live in the present more and others focus more on the future.

Hall reminds us that some cultures such as Asian cultures values silence and indirect communication and so they use high context communication. This is possible because their societies are mostly similar with similar perceptions and expectations and so there is no need for many words, instructions, directions etc. On the other hand low context cultures like the US among others values more words , directions, instructions etc, because we are very diverse and so more words are needed to make the situation understandable to all.

Hofstede’s theory highlights the values of Individualism (focus on I),collectivism (focus on we),high uncertainty avoidance (need laws to reduce unpredictability ), low uncertainty avoidance (comfortable with unpredictability), high power distance ( distinction between managers and employees ), low power distance (we are all equal), masculinity ( male oriented societies), femininity ( both genders should be nurturing and concerned with the quality of life),long term orientation ( organizational loyalty is valued), short term orientation ( merit in organizations is valued). Lastly note that Hofstede’s categorized countries that fall into each spectrum listed here, this helps us to understand our similarities and differences better. For example, Japan and Mexico are more male dominated countries where as Norway and Sweden are more feminine oriented societies.

Minkov categorizes countries that fall under monumentalism because they are proud of their achievement and have many statues and those that fall under flexhumility because they are humble about their achievements. Lastly for Face and facework, know that face means your self-image, you dignity etc. Thus individualist countries save their own face where as collective societies save the face of the group. For example if there is a chance for conflict collective societies with try to avoid it, on the other hand individualistic societies are focused more on getting their point across even at the risk of a confrontation.

References:

Samovar L, Porter R, McDaniel E, Roy C, 2017. Communication between cultures (9ed) Boston MA. Cengage Learning

Answer 1

In spite of progress made over the last two decades, almost 690 million people still suffer from chronic hunger. Meanwhile other forms of malnutrition are also on the rise: overweight and obesity, associated with the development of a significant surge in diet-related non-communicable diseases, affect almost four in ten adults worldwide. At the same time, more than two billion people suffer from various micronutrient deficiencies. This shows that, despite a stronger political commitment, investments and policies are not being fully effective in fighting hunger and malnutrition and are not reaching some population groups.

FAO works in partnership with governments and other development actors at global, regional and national levels to develop supportive policy and institutional environments. We help strengthen countries’ capacities to translate their political commitment into concrete action to eradicate hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition worldwide.

Make agriculture, forestry and fisheries more productive and sustainable

Satisfying the food and nutrition needs of an increasingly global population – projected to reach over 9 billion by 2050 –will put significant pressure on the different agricultural sectors, including crops, livestock, forestry and fisheries. Producing more with less to save natural resources, improve resilience and increase net incomes means that we need to make a clear shift away from current policies and practices towards more sustainable approaches. This transition is being mainstreamed through supporting countries to adopt a common vision for sustainable food and agriculture in support of the SDGs.

Reduce rural poverty

Hunger and food insecurity above all are expressions of poverty and most of the world’s poor live in rural areas. That’s why ending rural poverty is at the heart of FAO's work. Although progress has been made in reducing poverty globally, about 736 million people continue to live in extreme poverty and inequalities are still pervasive. By 2030, UN member countries have committed to eradicating extreme poverty and hunger for people everywhere. FAO is helping countries develop and implement evidence-based pro-poor policies, strategies and programmes that promote inclusive growth and sustainable livelihoods, income diversification, decent employment, access to social protection and empowerment of women and men in agriculture and in rural areas.

Enable inclusive and efficient agricultural and food systems

With increasing globalization, agriculture as an independent sector will cease to exist, becoming instead, just one part of an integrated value chain. The value chain exits both upstream and downstream, or from production through to processing and sales, in which the whole is now highly concentrated, integrated and globalized. This poses a huge challenge for smallholder farmers and agricultural producers in many developing countries where even the most economically valid smallholders can easily be excluded from important parts of the value chain.

Increasing their participation in food and agricultural systems is critical to achieving FAO’s goal of a world without hunger.

Increase the resilience of livelihoods to threats and crises

Conflict, natural hazards and economic crises are driving up global hunger, causing extensive human suffering and threatening years of progress in fighting poverty, food insecurity and malnutrition. Up to 80 percent of those hit by crises are rural families who rely on agriculture for their survival. As such, FAO seeks to strengthen the resilience of agriculture-based livelihoods against multiple hazards. By bringing together humanitarian and development actions, with a deliberate focus on contributing to sustaining peace, FAO addresses the root causes of hunger while meeting the immediate needs of those affected by crisis. This involves: supporting governments and communities to prepare for, mitigate and address threats; monitoring risks and strengthening early warning systems at global, national and local levels, linking these to preventative action; actively working with communities to reduce risks and vulnerability; and providing immediate support to crisis-hit families to save lives, safeguard livelihoods and lay the foundations for more resilient futures.