Malaysian Media and Public Service Perspective on Food Security and Food Terrorism During the Pandemic

Food security remains a global concern and with the recent health crisis in the form of a pandemic has unleashed the lack of awareness and understanding of the public, media included, on food security, especially with the potential of threats towards food security in the form of food terrorism. With that in mind, there is thus a growing necessity to analyse the understanding of media and public service personnel on food security in Malaysia where it will deliberate on the perspectives of media and public service personnel on food security policy and threats of food terrorism. By employing the phenomenology approach, significant findings were derived from conducting in-depth interviews with a sample size of 6 media and public service personnel experts in food security and food terrorism. The data was collected concurrently, and the data analysis was conducted using the thematic analysis approach. It was found that both media and public service personnel managed to have basic understanding on food security elements albeit with adequate knowledge and comprehension on its policies, framework and approach. Furthermore, although quite foreign with the term, the informants felt that food terrorism has the ability to pose threats to the country if the threats are taken lightly. Essentially, food security may be employed as this country's firewall to prevent food terrorism threats, with the public to be sensitized on the subject of food terrorism first. Government must also optimize new media to protect this country's food security as well as prevention of food terrorism threats.