The Sustainability of Tunisian Arid Food Systems Between the Limits of Environmental Supply and the Challenges of Food Security for Rural Populations: Case of Cereal Farming

Cereal farming plays a key role in food security for all countries since it is cultivated over large areas and the crops are often stored for later use, which allows meeting the food demand even during periods of shortage or economic instability. By promoting the production and storage of cereals, cereal farming helps reduce the risks of famine and food insecurity, particularly among the most vulnerable farming communities. In Tunisia’s arid region, this strategy of managing uncertainty has characterized traditional food systems, allowing them to become sustainable and rural communities to limit the effects of climate and economic hazards. Based mainly on barley and durum wheat, cereal farming has in the past been able to meet the food needs of people and their livestock thanks to a resource management and food system adapted to the fragility of agroecosystems. However, the increase in population numbers and changes in land use and feeding patterns, with a clear trend towards consumption of soft wheat, which is barely produced in the country, have led to an increase in demand for this product. However, neither the very irregular climatic conditions nor the national and international political instability have made it possible to meet these growing food needs. In the arid region of Tunisia, cereal farming is increasingly marginalized since its problems related to the weakness and fluctuation of production and yields have persisted in addition to the pressure that this activity is subjected to by other agricultural activities, considered more profitable, such as olive farming and greenhouse farming. Furthermore, the transformations of eating habits have led, in southern Tunisia, to a gradual abandonment of culinary traditions and know-how. Today, the sustainability of these food systems is deeply compromised, and the disruption of its equilibrium has reached an almost irreversible threshold.