Across the developing world, populations—both urban and rural—rely on markets for food and income. The production, trade, and distribution systems flows that support these markets are powerful forces, influenced by suppliers, traders, and buyers responding to changes in supply and demand, ultimately determining prices and the availability of and access to food. Understanding current and projected market, trade, and price trends is critical to the success of FEWS NET’s integrated food security analysis. The Structure-Conduct-Performance analytical framework guides the FEWS NET approach to markets and trade analysis.

FEWS NET’s markets and trade knowledge base is the starting point for understanding the market context. Core products include a large price database, national and regional production and trade flow maps, and Market Fundamentals Reports. These reports provide decision makers and organizations with an overview of the structure, conduct, and performance of markets, and provide the foundation for an annual market monitoring plan.

FEWS NET regularly monitors and reports on local staple food availability, prices, regional trade flows, and macroeconomic drivers. Monthly marketing reports, Price Bulletins, the Price Watch, Supply and Market Outlook reports, and Cross-Border Trade reports are regularly produced. Additionally, FEWS NET conducts Enhanced Market Analysis in select countries, focused on providing food assistance modality choice decision support. 

With information from the knowledge base along with market monitoring data, the markets and trade sector contributes key inputs into scenario development, FEWS NET’s methodology to develop food security projections. Market specialists collaborate with food security analysts to integrate assumptions on production and commodity balances, trade flows, and prices into FEWS NET’s analysis. Price projections may also be produced, and take into consideration key market drivers (fundamentals analysis) and historical price trends analysis (technical analysis). For guidance on the formulation of price projections, see FEWS NET’s guidance document on Developing Price Projections for Food Security Early Warning. 

FEWS NET cooperates closely with a network of food, agricultural and economic entities, relying on them for expertise as well as data on prices and other economic indicators. This network includes national ministries of agriculture, statistical offices, and market information systems, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, the World Food Program, and others. In a handful of countries, FEWS NET has teams of market monitors who collect data.