Agricultural value chains and food security in the Pacific: Evidence from Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands

Small island developing states in the Pacific face multiple development challenges driven by rapid population growth and high transportation costs due to remoteness and isolation. Combined with the adverse consequences of extreme weather events and climate change, these challenges exacerbate poverty and food insecurity. Agricultural value chain development presents a pathway to poverty reduction and food security. In this paper, we assess the impacts of two value chain development projects in Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands on dietary diversity and food security of small-scale producers. Project impacts on dietary diversity are positive and significant in both countries, but improved food security is only observed in Solomon Islands. These impacts are mainly driven by crop yields, value of crop production and sales, crop diversification and share of crop sales. We find that treatment households are more likely to consume less nutritious foods such as sweets and oils. Our findings expand the literature in a data-scarce region and caution that value chain interventions without nutrition-focused components to induce behavioral change may have unintended impacts on healthy diets.

Automated summary

Small island developing states in the Pacific face multiple development challenges, such as rapid population growth and high transportation costs. This paper assesses the impacts of value chain development projects in Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands on dietary diversity and food security, finding positive impacts on dietary diversity in both countries, but improved food security only in Solomon Islands.