Abstract
South Africa’s rural subsistence communities struggle not merely for food but the right to define food on their terms. Under the dominant banner of food security, this paper interrogates post-Apartheid food policy, displacing food sovereignty as a political and cultural imperative. It argues that this displacement is not incidental, but part of an intentional epistemic reordering in which technocratic, market-driven approaches to agriculture and nutrition overwrite traditional, communal, and land-based knowledge systems. Using a qualitative methodology grounded in policy analysis, discourse tracing, and cultural critique, the paper draws on extant literature and secondary data, including case studies from rural provinces, to explore how development discourses reframe rural subsistence deficiency. The analysis reveals that the state’s alignment with agro-industrial capital and international food security agendas marginalises community-based food systems, reduces local autonomy, and accelerates cultural erosion. Rather than empowering rural communities, food policies often institutionalise dependency, erasing intergenerational seed saving practices, communal farming, and ecological stewardship. The findings demonstrate that the dominance of food security discourse narrows the space for alternative agricultural imaginaries and undermines the cultural resilience of rural communities. The paper concludes that policy approaches must shift from measuring food availability to understanding food as a site of power, identity, and sovereignty. Reimagining food politics through a decolonial and sovereignty-centred lens offers a more just and sustainable framework for addressing rural development in South Africa. Thus, it calls for renewed critical attention to how policy discourses structure inclusion, exclusion, and knowledge legitimacy in post-Apartheid agrarian futures.
Presenters
Edmore NtiniSenior Lecturer & Chair of the SRHDC, Development Studies - Community Development, University of KwaZulu-Natal - Howard College, Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
KEYWORDS
Rural subsistence, Food sovereignty, Food security, Post-Apartheid policy, Epistemic displacement
