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Most studies of famine and the African food crisis stress how the socio-economic context affects the occurence of food shortages. In contrast, this book argues that food insecurity itself influences the social and economic organization of the society. Through this approach, the author provides a new interpretation of the causes and consequences of Tanzania's present economic crisis. The book examines the impact of changing food availability on the functioning of the state, the market and clientage networks over the past seven decades. The conclusion is that clientage is no less important than the state and market as an organizational force in Tanzanian society, and, under heightened food insecurity, the state and market lose ground to clientage

The concept of 'transnational family' coalesced in the context of neo-liberal globalisation during the late 1990s and 2000s. This article traces the social, economic and political forces that hove influenced the spread of transnational families throughout the world during the 21st century. Meanwhile, the digital revolution in social media communication and cheapening international travel costs has facilitated transnational family members communication with one another. Examining material exchanges between transnational family members in sending and receiving countries, childcare support for migrants' left-behind children provided by home-based family members has been a critical enabler of women's out-migration. In turn, migrants' remittance payments have been a basic lifeline or a source of improved standards of living for family members in sending countries. Overtime, global neo-liberal policies have generated the context for the expansion of transnational family migration through promotion of international travel and Internet communication. However, neo-liberalism has inadvertently paved the way for the growth of national precariots and one-state populism resting on segments of Western notional populations' resentment of international migration. Collapsing neo-liberalism as well as the intensification of global warming and the onset of the COVID pandemic are likely to influence the future of global migration and transnational familyhood in, as yet, indeterminont ways.

The concept of 'transnational family' coalesced in the context of neo-liberal globalisation during the late 1990s and 2000s. This article traces the social, economic and political forces that have influenced the spread of transnational families throughout the world during the 21st century. Meanwhile, the digital revolution in social media communication and cheapening international travel costs has facilitated transnational family members communication with one another. Examining material exchanges between transnational family members in sending and receiving countries, childcare support for migrants' left-behind children provided by home-based family members has been a critical enabler of women's out-migration. In turn, migrants' remittance payments have been a basic lifeline or a source of improved standards of living for family members in sending countries. Overtime, global neo-liberal policies have generated the context for the expansion of transnational family migration through promotion of international travel and internet communication. However, neo-liberalism has inadvertently paved the way for the growth of national precariats and one-state populism resting on segments of Western national populations' resentment of international migration. Collapsing neo-liberalism as well as the intensification of global warming and the onset of the COVID pandemic are likely to influence the future of global migration and transnational familyhood in, as yet, indeterminant ways.

To make sense of the 2007/08 global food crisis, three decades of agrarian change in the global South are examined, focusing on sub-Saharan Africa. At issue are the position of African smallholder peasant agriculture & the changing character of African staple food demand in the broader picture, particularly in terms of why signs of increasing global food supply constraints were ignored despite international donor agency claims of concern for alleviating African rural poverty. Discussion opens with a look at the development perspective that benefited the African peasantry until the 1970s global oil crisis undid those gains & ravaged national economies. The gap between African & Asian farmers & European & US farmers in terms of value added is noted before looking at African deagarianization as agricultural labor has shifted toward more lucrative pursuits, eg, mining, & experimental nonagricultural livelihoods combined with subsistence agriculture for insurance. The result has been a "depeasantization" across Africa as the economic sustainability of smallholder agriculture has eroded since the 1970s oil crises. Concomitant with that is a strong urbanization trend that has increased food demand that devolved into food riots as oil prices spiked in 2008. Whether it is worthwhile for governments & international donors to resuscitate African smallholder agriculture in light of a hostile global market & policy context centered on a supply-side perspective that favors economies of scale is then considered, asserting that food aid & food imports should be eschewed in favor of equitable investments targeting the smallholder. Adapted from the source document.

Over the past ten years, Malawian peasant farming households have endured a number of material and life-threatening setbacks. The absence of subsidised fertiliser loans to farmers continues to trouble villagers a decade after their removal. Yields of both food and cash crops have been declining. Farming households' earnings from agricultural exports and remittances have decreased. The creeping and then intensified incidence of HIV/AIDS infection has led to widespread debility and death, compounded by a serious famine in 2001–03. During the famine and its aftermath, ganyu casual labour gained in importance as a source of income, especially for women and youth from poor rural households. Field evidence suggests that the highly exploitative contractual terms that employers offered widened the gap between the haves and have-nots, and fuelled the risks of contracting HIV/AIDS. Ganyu, representing an established form of labour based on mutual economic benefit between exchange agents stretching back over a century, has become synonymous with degradation and despair for the working poor.

This article explores the concepts of livelihoods, sustainability and poverty alleviation with reference to recent rural economy survey findings in subSaharan Africa, policies in the international development policy arena during the last 20 years, and South Africa's rural history. It is argued that processes of deagrarianisation and depeasantisation have accelerated in association with the implementation of structural adjustment policies. Village case-study evidence from various African countries indicates a decline in peasant commodity production, a surge in non-agricultural income diversification, the proliferation of multi-occupational households, accelerating rural class stratification and growing poverty ('non-agricultural' activities are those that do not directly involve plant or animal husbandry). International financial institutions, specifically the World Bank, have become increasingly alert to rural poverty over the last few years but tend to ignore their policy influence in this field. The sustainable rural livelihoods approach acknowledges structural change in rural areas but has not yet fully analysed the depth of ongoing change and the policy scope needed to deflect rural poverty. A schematic look at deagrarianisation in South Africa and the effect of past and present policy interventions in South African rural areas illustrates the potential continental dimensions of agricultural labour displacement.