World food situation require more than statements to stabilize.

World food situation require more than statements to stabilize.
The meeting organized by FAO just ended last week with calls from various quarters sounding an alarm over food situation and the need to act fast. The meeting brought together various world leaders including the Pope who noted dragging of feet to eliminate hunger that kills 17m children annually. Missing in action were the leaders of the G8, apart from Italy’s PM who was the host. It would be expected that a question as serious as food crisis would be at the centre stage in world matters yet from the look of things this is not the case. The statistics issued by FAO, reveal that millions of people are starving despite the rise of technology and development.
It beats logic that food is a basic human need yet millions go without it or receive less than is expected in terms of quantity and quality. Consequently, there is need to look at what is not adding up and make plausible proposals to sort out this shame once and for all. As the Pope noted in his address ‘Win the battle against Hunger’ (www.zenit.org )the problem of food is not the scarcity of material but the scarcity of institutional political will that would stabilize the right to sufficient, healthy and nutritious food to all.
The lack of such institutions among nations, skewed market policies, skyrocketing prices of basic necessities, and having world priorities upside down demonstrated by the skipping of such an important meeting by top leaders explains why this situation is a time bomb. I would actually think that with the economic crisis the issue of food be a top priority needing urgent attention and long term solution. However, all is not lost but we must act together and very fast as the Director General, FAO, Jacques Diouf urged in his speech to reach ‘broad consensus on the total and rapid elimination of hunger’.(www.fao.org ) by pulling down all the structures that cause food crisis, stop price speculation on food and set policies that guide the international market to respect weak economies. When this is said and done, then I dream…
I imagine of a world that spends more resources to put in place mechanisms of food sustenance, one that spends resources teaching people how to fish than give them handouts; one that recognizes the basic needs of man as rights and provides the necessary to realize what that means; other than a world where unwarranted wars are mega-funded, where scientific studies that degrade the dignity of man are the order of the day; where rich countries tie funding to conditions that harness corruption and condemn a nation to perpetual begging and mind boggling unjust debts.
But I cringe to know that this is only a pipe dream. Were it not a dream the ‘big ones’ would have come knocking, calling for a united affront against the common enemy. However, they were busy elsewhere visiting the East that has become a giant or were celebrating some historical event somewhere in France as the minnows shouted themselves hoarse. I am afraid and indeed afraid that recommendations from the FAO meeting asking for $44M annually to combat hunger will only dust in some shelves somewhere.