a country can find itself in an emergency situation due to a specific shock that requires a rapid response a price spike of a staple food or sudden food inflation a severe drought that produces crop failure or an economic slowdown reducing the income of the poor a local natural disaster like an earthquake that destroys assets and livelihoods the framework set out in this report is not concerned with the management of disasters and emergencies themselves but rather with the portfolio of policies that can respond to transitory shocks to food availability and access many countries are prone to potential events that could occur at any time and plunge large segments of the population into extreme food insecurity of unspecified duration