J. Trop. Resour. Sustain. Sci. 1(2): 1-11 Journal of Tropical Resources and Sustainable Science j o urnal hom e p age: w w w. jtrss.com.my ISSN Number: 2289-3946 © 2013 UMK Publisher. All rights reserved. 1 Spatial Patterns of Food Security in Haryana: A District-level Analysis Savita Ahlawat *, Dhian Kaur 1 Department of Geography, Panjab University, Chandigarh 160014, India 2 Department of Geography, Panjab University, Chandigarh 160014, India Keywords: Food accessibility Food availability Food security index Topography Food utilization ⌧ ⁎Corresponding Author: Savita Ahlawat Departmentof Geography, Panjab University, Chandigarh, India. Email address: savi.ahlawat31@g mail.com Abstract In today‟s era the issue of food security is gaining much more attention as food is one of the three basic requirements of man and is still a serious issue for many poor people. Ensuring food security is a big challenge due to increase in population, climate change etc. especially in developing Asian countries like India. The present study is significant in a way that it examines the variations in spatial patterns of food security at district level in one of the food bowl states of India namely Haryana. This study also tries to identify the factors behind the spatial variations in food security. Despite being self-sufficient in foodgrains production, the state has vast regional contrasts in terms of land productivity, farm labour and standard of living. At present, food grains production is almost stagnant in the state and natural resources are also experiencing degradation due to their extensive use. For this study, secondary data have been collected from various state government offices. Further food availability, food accessibility and food utilization indices have been calculated by using different indicators. The results of the study reveal that the districts situated in central and north-west part of the state having better agricultural infrastructure are more food secure than the districts situated in southern and northern parts of the state which have the disadvantageous the state which have sandy soil, poor irrigation facilities and undulating topography. © 2013 UMK Publisher. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction The concept of food security emerged in 1970s due to global food crisis (1972-74) which reduced global supplies and threatened the food security status of food importing nations. This term food security was first used in World Food Conference held in Rome in 1974. At that time food security was defined as the „availability at all times of adequate supply of basic foodstuffs‟ (UN, 1975). This concept has undergone sufficient change since 1970s. In 1980‟s, a new dimension of accessibility was added in its concept after Amartya Sen‟s (1981) theory of food entitlement. As per this theory, people are usually starved mainly because of lack of the ability to access food rather than because of its availability. Therefore, FAO in 1983 defined food security as “ensuring that all people at all times have both physical and economic access to the basic food they need”. During 1990s a third dimension – food utilization - also became prominent in food security discussions. This dimension is determined primarily