The Right Honourable the Deputy Prime Minister Salah Ahmed Jama,
The Right Honourable Minister of State for Development and Africa Andrew Mitchell, my very good friend,
Honourable ministers, distinguished guests, dear colleagues and friends,
I thank Prime Minister Sunak and the government of the United Kingdom for convening this important summit.
You are all familiar with the saying, "You are what you eat."
Of course, that's true of diet and health, but it's true in other ways as well.
Food is an essential part of culture, faith, sport, even art.
Food is part of what it means to be human. Food is life.
And yet for so many people in our world, especially children, food - or the lack of it - is a source of sickness and death.
In 2015, the world committed to eliminating hunger and other forms of malnutrition by 2030, as part of the Sustainable Development Goals.
As with many of the SDGs, we are a long way from reaching that target.
A few statistics:
45 million children under five in our world - one in 15 - are wasted, meaning they are dangerously thin for their height.
More than one-third of these children, nearly 14 million, have the most severe form of wasting, with the greatest risk of dying.
A child who is moderately or severely wasted is 11 times more likely to die than a child who is not malnourished, often because his or her body is too weak to fight back against diarrhoea and pneumonia.
An estimated one million children a year die because of wasting.
Think about that: by the time we have finished our meeting today, about 900 children will have died because they don't have enough food or care - children whose lives have only just begun.
The factors that drive wasting vary, but are largely a result of poverty and rising food prices, preventable diseases, inadequate access to health care, and a lack of clean water, sanitation and hygiene.
Conflict, the climate crisis, natural disasters and resource depletion all dramatically increase the risk of hunger and famine.
Malnutrition is also generational.
An infant's nutritional status is linked closely to the nutritional status of her or his mother before, during and after pregnancy.
Poor maternal nutrition impairs foetal development and contributes to low birthweight, wasting and poor growth.
Children who survive will suffer from malnutrition and ill health for most of their lives, and be stuck in a vicious cycle of poverty, debt, and ill-health.
Severe acute malnutrition can be treated, with therapeutic milks, foods and fluid support, at home or in a health facility, according to the needs of the child.
Although treatment coverage has increased, many children with severe acute malnutrition cannot access sufficient care.
Earlier this year, WHO added ready-to-use therapeutic foods to our Essential Medicines List. We hope this will increase the production and availability of therapeutic foods, and reduce the price.
The Global Action Plan on Child Wasting, developed by WHO and other UN agencies, is a call to action to improve the prevention and management of wasting.
To support the Global Action Plan, WHO has today published a new guideline on the prevention and management of wasting, as Andrew indicated earlier.
It highlights the importance of adequate home diets and access to quality health services.
It stresses early identification of mothers in need and infants at risk of poor growth and development.
It recommends better integration of nutrition services into health systems and to empower community health workers to treat children with acute malnutrition in communities.
WHO is working with UNICEF and other UN agencies to support governments and health workers to implement these recommendations, and adapt them to country needs.
We are seeing some encouraging signs of progress.
Twenty-three countries have now completed country roadmaps to tackle wasting in children.
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I congratulate these countries for their leadership.
Now we must support these countries to turn their roadmaps into action and lives saved.
We are grateful to those donors who have supported the development of the guidelines, and who have committed to fund their implementation.
Deputy Prime Minister, Minister, dear colleagues and friends,
My thanks again to the UK for its leadership in bringing us together, and for bringing attention to this critical issue.
Many of us here are parents. The thought of our own children suffering from malnutrition is intolerable.
The thought of anyone's child suffering in this way is intolerable.
That thought must drive us to action. And there is something we can do.
Because these deaths are predictable and preventable.
WHO looks forward to working with all of you to make food a source of life and hope for all the children of our world.
I thank you.
