Sustainable Food

World Summit on Food Security Set to Disappoint

by Katherine Gustafson

categories: Hunger, Policy, Politics

Published November 16, 2009 @ 06:00AM PT

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Today begins the World Summit on Food Security, organized by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and scheduled to run through Wednesday in Rome, Italy.

The FAO estimates that 1.02 billion people are undernourished in 2009, and with a world population set to reach 9 billion by 2050, the ranks of the hungry are sure to balloon unless aggressive action is taken on an international level.

Reuters reports, however, that the summit's progress will be no more than a token; there will be no deadlines or commitments to action despite the FAO's hope of gaining pledges of $44 billion a year from world leaders to help poor countries grow enough food. A draft of the declaration, Reuters says, includes a vague promise to fund more agricultural development with no specific commitments toward ending hunger.

Admittedly the problems are large and complex. The summit sets out to address key questions, specifically how to:

• make sure the 9 billion will have food;
• bolster governance around food security;
• give developing counties a fair shake at competing in international trade;
• safeguard farmers' livelihoods;
• get public and private sectors to invest in agriculture;
• find ways to solve food crises before they're out of control; and
• ensure that food systems can adapt to climate change.

So while tackling all of this could be biting off more than they can chew, world leaders could at least make some concrete commitments to addressing aspects of this problem.

Humanitarian groups ActionAid and Oxfam accuse the global community of being complacent in the wake of committing $20 billion to the issue at the G-8 Summit in July. The two NGOs said in a joint statement that the "the $20 billion is a mirage" because "less than a quarter of this money is new." They also said the summit "could be a waste of time and money unless world leaders intervene now to salvage it."

Let's hope the US takes some bold move to spur more aggressive action this week, considering that President Obama, as the New York Times writes, "has made improving the productivity of farmers in the developing world a top priority since taking office." He was the one, after all, who drummed up international support for the multibillion-dollar initiative that now has everyone resting on their laurels.

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