BuaNews (Tshwane)
Bathandwa Mbola
4 June 2008
Rome — Noting the unsustainable levels of poverty and underdevelopment, Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka has urged member states and donors to increase their contributions to the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO).
Addressing a high-level three-day conference on food security and the challenges of climate change and bio-energy in Rome on Tuesday, she said this would ensure that developing countries continue to receive the best advice and information to help them deal with the challenges.
"The chronic neglect by developed countries and non-contributions, late payments and arrears are all strangling the work of FAO, which poor countries could benefit from.
"African countries need Technical Cooperation Programmes. Without finance, from those who can afford, these cannot be realised," Ms Mlambo-Ngcuka told the summit.
The summit is attended by world leaders and it is discussing the roles of biofuels, trade practices and impact of global warming on food prices, which are threatening hunger, poverty and conflict worldwide.
It also aims to assist countries and the international community in devising sustainable solutions to the food crisis by identifying the policies, strategies and programmes required to safeguard world food security in the immediate, short and longer term.
It is also expected to feed into broader inter-agency and intergovernmental processes.
In this regard, the deputy president told the summit that in Africa- agriculture forms a major part of economic activity, from subsistence to large scale commercial farming.
She however noted that there was a need to significantly and vigorously increase the current level of agricultural productivity and provide support to this important sector to enable countries to become food exporters again.
South Africa has already committed to increase social safety nets, agricultural land under production, human resource development, technology transfer, financial support for small and medium sized farmers.
"Very importantly, we give support to women who act as frontline combatants in the fight against poverty and hunger.
"We support the alliance for the Green Revolution in Africa," said Ms Mlambo-Ngcuka
Also speaking at the conference, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called for bold and urgent steps to address the root causes of this global food crisis.
"We have a historic opportunity to revitalise agriculture," Mr Ban told some 50 heads of state attending the summit, adding that food output had to rise 50 percent by 2030 to meet the ballooning demand.
With food prices at a 30-year high, the UN chief warned that while the world must "respond immediately," it must also put the long-term focus on "improving food security."
Prices have doubled in three years, according to the World Bank, sparking riots in Egypt and Haiti and in many African nations. Brazil, Vietnam, India and Egypt have all imposed food export restrictions. -
Read comments. Write your own.
Copyright © 2008 BuaNews. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
Hi! I think that a great deal of the problem lies in the climate change issue. Therefore I would like to recommend the website www.treehoo.com that plants trees for most of its profit. It's a great and easy way to fight the global warming for free by just using the website to search the internet and so on. No other webportal offers this, so why not try it?