Which of the following is/are NOT a dimension of food security ? 1. Availability 2. Accessibility 3. Affordability 4. Accountability Select the correct answer from the code given below :
- (a)1 and 2
- (b)2, 3 and 4
- (c)Only 4
- (d)Only 1
Correct — C, Only 4. Availability, accessibility and affordability are the three dimensions of food security in the standard Indian textbook framing, and the FAO's own list of pillars — availability, access, utilization and stability — is built on the same idea. Availability means enough food physically exists, through domestic production, stocks and imports. Accessibility means that food is within reach of every person, not just present somewhere in the country. Affordability means a household has enough income to buy sufficient, safe and nutritious food. Accountability is a governance principle — the answerability of officials and institutions for their decisions. It is something you demand of a public distribution system, not a dimension of food security itself, and it appears in no standard list of pillars. So statement 4 alone is not a dimension, and the answer is (c).
- (a)1 and 2 — Availability and accessibility are the first two dimensions in every framework — the FAO's 1996 World Food Summit definition itself speaks of all people, at all times, having physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food. Marking them as 'not dimensions' inverts the concept.
- (b)2, 3 and 4 — It correctly spots accountability but drags accessibility and affordability out with it. Affordability is precisely the economic-access half of the FAO definition, and accessibility is the physical half; a country can hold record foodgrain stocks and still be food-insecure if households cannot reach or buy them.
- (d)Only 1 — Availability is the most basic dimension of the four — the supply side, covering production, distribution, exchange and buffer stocks. Calling it 'not a dimension' is the single clearest error among the options.
Food security means that all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life — the definition agreed at the 1996 World Food Summit. It is deliberately multi-dimensional: a country with full granaries is not food-secure if the poor cannot reach the grain or cannot pay for it. The FAO conventionally names four pillars — availability, access, utilization and stability — and in 2020 the High-Level Panel of Experts proposed adding two more, agency and sustainability, taking the count to six. Indian school and PCS syllabi compress the same idea into availability, accessibility and affordability.
This is an odd-one-out question wearing statement-code clothing. Three of the four words begin with 'a' and belong together; the fourth is imported from a different vocabulary altogether — public administration. That is the whole design. The safe method is to ask of each word: is this a condition a household must satisfy to be food-secure, or a virtue we ask of the state? Availability, accessibility and affordability are conditions of the household's food situation. Accountability is a quality of the delivery system. Also read the stem carefully — it asks which is NOT a dimension, and options (a), (b) and (d) all reward a candidate who has flipped the polarity.
- 1996 World Food Summit definition: food security exists when all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life
- FAO pillars: availability (supply through production, distribution and exchange), access (affordability and allocation), utilization (metabolism of food by the individual) and stability (obtaining food over time)
- The High-Level Panel of Experts proposed two further dimensions in 2020 — agency and sustainability — making six in current usage
- 'Accountability' is not listed as a dimension of food security in any of these frameworks; it belongs to the governance of delivery systems such as the PDS
- India's statutory expression of accessibility and affordability is the National Food Security Act, 2013, which covers up to 75 per cent of the rural and 50 per cent of the urban population
Answer (c) Only 4: three words describe the food situation of a household, the fourth describes the conduct of an administration.
- Answering the opposite question — the stem says NOT a dimension, and three of the four options reward a flipped reading
- Treating availability alone as food security, the classic 'full godowns, empty plates' error that the accessibility and affordability dimensions exist to correct
- Assuming the FAO list and the Indian textbook list must match word for word; utilization and stability are FAO pillars that the availability/accessibility/affordability formulation folds in rather than names
UPPSC asks the definition and its components directly, often in this odd-one-out form; UPSC prefers the operational layer — what the National Food Security Act actually provides, which crops the National Food Security Mission targets, how procurement and buffer stocks work.
With reference to the provisions made under the National Food Security Act, 2013, consider the following statements: 1. The families coming under the category of 'below poverty line (BPL)' only are eligible to receive subsidised food grains. 2. The eldest woman in a household, of age 18 years or above, shall be the head of the household for the purpose of issuance of a ration card. 3. Pregnant women and lactating mothers are entitled to a 'take-home ration' of 1600 calories per day during pregnancy and for six months thereafter. Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
- (a) 1 and 2
- (b) 2 only
- (c) 1 and 3
- (d) 3 only
Answer(b) 2 only
The accessibility and affordability dimensions turned into law. The NFSA question turns on who is covered and on what terms — exactly the household-level reach that makes food security more than the availability of grain.
An objective of the National Food Security Mission is to increase the production of certain crops through area expansion and productivity enhancement in a sustainable manner in the identified districts of the country. What are those crops?
- (a) Rice and wheat only
- (b) Rice, wheat and pulses only
- (c) Rice, wheat, pulses and oilseeds only
- (d) Rice, wheat, pulses, oilseeds and vegetables
Answer(b) Rice, wheat and pulses only
The availability pillar on its own — a mission built to raise production of specific crops. Read alongside this UPPSC question it shows why availability alone was never treated as sufficient.
With reference to the National Food Security Act, which of the following statements is/are correct ? I. It will cover up to 75 percent rural and 50 percent urban population. II. Special focus on nutritional support to women and children. III. Eldest woman of above 18 years age will be head of household. Select the correct answer using the codes given below :
- (a) I and II are correct
- (b) II and III are correct
- (c) I, II and III are correct
- (d) None of these
Answer(c) I, II and III are correct
UPPSC's own earlier take on the same theme: where the 2025 paper tests the concept of food security, the 2019 paper tests the statute that delivers it. Both reward knowing that coverage and access, not stocks, are the operative idea.
- practice — not a real PYQ
Which of the following is NOT one of the four pillars of food security as conventionally listed by the FAO?
- (a)Availability
- (b)Access
- (c)Utilization
- (d)Accountability
Answer(d) Accountability — the FAO's four pillars are availability, access, utilization and stability; agency and sustainability were proposed as additional dimensions in 2020.
- practice — not a real PYQ
The definition of food security as all people, at all times, having physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food was adopted at the:
- (a)Rio Earth Summit, 1992
- (b)World Food Summit, 1996
- (c)Millennium Summit, 2000
- (d)Rome Declaration on Nutrition, 2014
Answer(b) World Food Summit, 1996 — the wording is the FAO's standard reference definition.