World Food Day 2006
 Agricultural growth and hunger
Many studies have shown how agricultural growth reduces poverty and hunger, even more than urban or industrial growth. For example, the only group of countries to reduce hunger during the 1990s was the group in which the agriculture sector grew. Looking back at the figures for the last 30 years, it can be shown that those countries that have invested and continue to invest most in agriculture — both public and private — now experience the lowest levels of undernourishment.
The investors
Most of the world’s farmers are small-scale farmers. As a group, these men and women are the biggest investors in agriculture.
They also tend to be foodinsecure; that is, their access to food is inadequate or precarious. If they can make a profit with their farming, they can feed their families adequately throughout the year and reinvest in their farms by purchasing fertilizer, better quality seed and basic equipment.
Small producers face many obstacles that are beyond their control: lack of credit, insecure land tenure, poor transport, low prices and poorly developed business relations with agribusinesses at the commercial end of the agricultural supply chain – to say nothing of natural factors such as drought, flood, pests and disease.
[...] Supermarkets are becoming the biggest players in national, regional and international food supply chains, setting grades and standards and even making cross-border supply chains work.
Read on in the  WFD 2006 leaflet…
FAO’s Director General quotes Platform in opening speech
“Recently there has been a significant revival in lending for agriculture. Debt forgiveness programmes, strengthened by the G8 decision in 2005, have begun to release national resources for investment in agriculture. But much still remains to be done,” said FAO Director-General Dr. Jacques Diouf.
Opening Ceremony World Food Day 2006
Dr. Diouf was addressing the annual World Food Day ceremony which marks the founding of FAO in 1945 and is observed in over 150 countries. The World Food Day and TeleFood theme for 2006 is Investing in agriculture for food security which is critical to halve hunger by 2015.
The FAO Director-General said that “in 2002, FAO estimated that the combined extra public cost of all investment to meet the 2015 World Food Summit target is around US$19 billion for agricultural growth and productivity enhancement in rural areas and US$5 billion for programmes which provide direct and immediate access to food for those in greatest need.”
“Increasing the volume of public investment in agriculture but also making it more effective are of absolute necessity. One major mechanism is the Global Donor Platform for Rural Development, a consortium of 26 development agencies, which seeks to improve donor aid effectiveness and focus action on achieving the Millennium Development Goals,” stated Dr. Diouf.
Platform display during World Food Day 2006
“Despite the progress achieved in agriculture and rural development, more than 850 million people still remain hungry with few opportunities for work and increased income. Our greatest challenge today is to reach the objectives of the World Food Summit and first UN Millennium Development Goal, to halve by 2015 hunger and alleviate poverty worldwide,” he said.
For more information, please refer to  FAO - World Food Day 2006. |
Platform News No 2