GMFS Policy Foundation

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0><tr> <td valign="top" rowspan="2" width=210 BGCOLOR="#99CC99" TEXT="#080000" bgproperties="fixed" background="1948dfc3.jpg"> <div> <B><IMG SRC="1e4c6800.gif" border=0 width="198" height="128" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></div> <bR> <div> <A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="EnvironmentEcologyForestry"><U><B>Return to Home</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id8.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Trust and Mission"><U><B>Trust and Mission</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id33.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Resource Persons"><U><B>Resource Persons</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id26.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Curriculum Vitae of Claude R. Heimo"><U><I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700c811111100.gif" HEIGHT="13" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">CV Claude R. 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A primitive man has enjoyed the abundance of food at his own stake, only requiring his desire and effort to acquire it. But, modern man, despite the sophisticated and tremendous technological advances made during the past century is unable to meet one of the most basic needs of mankind. Millions of people are sick and dying due to the lack of food. It is disgracing not to be able to feed everyone in a world, which produces enough food for everyone to meet their daily minimum energy requirement.</div> <bR> <div> <I>Source: FAO, 1999</I></div> </tD> </tR> </TABLE></div> <bR> <div> At the World Food Summit of 1996 (WFS), the global community agreed to halve the number of hungry people in the world by 2015. This global commitment was renewed in 2000 at the Millennium Assembly attended by 188 Member States of the United Nations, which gather to UN Headquarters in New York to attend the 55th session of the UN General Assembly and endorse the Millennium Development Goals (MDG). To reach this target, 22 million people need to escape food insecurity every year. However, only 6 million have been fortunate enough to do so each year. Moreover, the situation has even deteriorated in Africa. As of November 2003, some 38 countries in the world were experiencing serious food security emergencies, most of them, or 23, were in Africa, 6 in Asia, 5 in Latin America and 2 in Europe. Two regions in Africa have faced the more severe food shortages: the Southern and the Horn of Africa. Given progress so far on the WFS and the Millennium goals, this commitment seems to have been mere lip service. In fact, for the vast majority of countries and institutions, food security has never made it near the top of the agenda.</div> <bR> <div> The aim of the GMFS project is to contribute to both, the World Food Summit and the Millennium Development Goals in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), in providing additional information on food security issues at sub-national, national and global levels. The current report analyses the Policy Foundation of Food Security. Its purpose is to briefly give a general overview of the global food security situation, clarify the concept and definition of food security, highlight the complexity of direct and indirect causes inducing food insecurity, hunger and famine; review major international and Africa-based commitments to food security and give a brief description of international and regional strategies and initiatives taken by international and/or regional institutions to improve the availability of information on food security and provide early warning in case of emerging famines, and, ultimately, combat food insecurity in Africa. The main outcome of this report are summarized below:</div> <bR> <div> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#FF0000" FACE="Arial" ><I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700dc0000ff00.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Famine and Hunger in Today's World</B></I> </FONT>(section 2): The latest FAO report on the State of Food Insecurity (SOFI 2003) estimates that, worldwide, 842 million people were undernourished in 1999-2001. This includes 10 million in the industrialized countries, 34 million in countries in transition and 798 million in developing countries. At the regional level, the numbers of undernourished were reduced in Asia and the Pacific and in Latin America and the Caribbean. In contrast, the numbers continue to rise in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) and in the Near East and North Africa, where the most frequent cause of chronic hunger is <I>poverty</I>. In many SSA countries, there are many examples of hungry people in food surplus areas - people who lack adequate income or assets to purchase or produce enough food for themselves and their families. Paradoxically, food insecurity is the most severe in rural Africa, where farming and herding are still the main means of livelihood. Ninety percent of the Africans living in poverty are rural dwellers. Furthermore, the number of people living in poverty in SSA increased from 184 million in 1985 to 216 million in 1990 to about 300 million in 2000. The number of African children under five years of age that are chronically hungry reflects the seriousness of the poverty problem. According to the 1996 Human Development Report, 22.5 million African children are malnourished. </div> <bR> <div> Fundamentally, if one could highlight five major conditions to food security progress in Africa, it should be recognized that agricultural production must be environmentally sustainable; compatible with population growth rate and technologically feasible to increase yields and raise output. Furthermore, farmers must be provided with adequate extension and delivery systems, notably in terms of infrastructures and institutions. There is, therefore, an urgent need to analyse Africa's food security issues in relation to the performance of the region's agriculture food sector and discuss the constraints to increased agricultural food production especially those of policy origin.</div> <bR> <div> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#FF0000" FACE="Arial" ><I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700dc0000ff00.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Food Insecurity, a Nexus of Complex Causes</B></I></FONT><I> </I>(section 3<I>)</I>: Food security depends on access to and returns from markets and all the global, national and local influences on returns in these markets. But food security depends not just on the behaviour of markets, but also on agricultural productivity, environment and access to natural resources and the performance of institutions of the state and society. Underlying asset ownership and returns to assets are not only economic but also fundamental political and social forces. Therefore, access to food security also depends on the legal structure that defines and enforces property rights and/or on customary norms that define the way common property resources are used. Food security may also be affected by implicit or explicit discrimination on the basis of gender, ethnicity, race, or social status. Also important for food security is the volatility of and returns from food markets. Volatility results from market fluctuations, weather conditions, and, in some societies, turbulent political conditions. Volatility affects not only returns, but also the value of assets, as shocks such as natural or man-made disasters undermine health, destroy natural and physical assets, or deplete savings. The main crucial determinants and areas of interactions affecting food security in developing countries, notably in SSA, could be summarized as follows:</div> <bR> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Poverty;</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Population pressure on limited natural resources;</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Decreasing agricultural productivity due to land degradation, inappropriate land use and land tenure systems and/or lack of improved seeds, fertilizers, other inputs, and training associated with improved agricultural technology;</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Extensive environmental degradation partly because the poor lack alternative production technologies which limits the sustainability of any gains in productivity that are achieved; </div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Natural disasters, conflicts and other types of violence;</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Lack of rural and urban off-farm employment opportunities, which limits incomes;</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Lack of integrated markets, at both regional and national levels, due to poor rural infrastructure, such as roads and transportation facilities, and state-controlled marketing policies that impair incentives for farmers;</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Limited access to education, which contributes to a low labour productivity and rising birth rates;</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Financial markets that do not promote savings and do prevent borrowing in times of need;</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Poor health and sanitation conditions due to lack of services and investment in health infrastructure and the rapid spreading of HIV/AIDS;</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The negative impacts of economic crisis, globalization and trade liberalization and/or inappropriate macroeconomic policies, including exchange-rate regulations and export taxes that historically have adversely affected the rural economy;</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Gender discrimination; and more generally</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The capacity of the poorest segment of the population to resist external shocks.</div> <bR> <div> In addition, the increasing emergence of long-term armed conflicts in countries (such as Sudan, Ethiopia, Rwanda, Burundi, Angola, Congo), inheritance from the colonial past (such as Malawi and Zimbabwe) could be quoted as escalating causes of food insecurity and famine. Conflicts lead to food shortages and food shortages lead to conflicts: conflict destroys land, water, biological, and social resources for food production, while military expenditures lower investments in health, education, agriculture, and environmental protection. Conflict leads to food insecurity or even famine through such deliberate acts as sieges of cities, stripping of victims' assets, destruction of markets, elimination of health care, and break-up of communities. Other consequences of war are less intentional: people, including farmers and pastoralists, lose their livelihoods when workplaces become inaccessible. </div> <bR> <div> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#FF0000" FACE="Arial" ><I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700dc0000ff00.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The Food Security Policy Foundation</B></I> </FONT>(section 4): Food security has different meaning for different people, but the definitions by FAO and WHO include some of the most important elements of food security. For FAO and WHO (1992), food security is defined as “<I>Access by all people at all times to the food needed for a healthy life</I>”. At the international level, food security or the Right to Food is, therefore, considered as one of the basic human rights and it is a binding obligation well-established under international law, recognized in the Universal Declaration on Human Rights,  the Article 11 of the International Covenants on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR -which have been ratified by 144 countries) as well as a plethora of other international instruments. However, very few governments, which have become party to the international instruments, particularly the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights have adopted legislative and other measures to realize the Right-to-Food. The Right-to-Food, like any other human rights, imposes three types of obligations on States parties: </div> <bR> <div> <I><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Obligations to respect</I>, which requires that States parties should not arbitrarily take away people's right to food, or make it difficult for them to gain access food;</div> <div> <I><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Obligations to protect</I>; which requires governments to pass laws to prevent powerful people or organizations from violating the right to food; and</div> <div> <I><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Obligations to fulfil, </I>which requires State parties to take positive measures to assist individuals and communities to enjoy the right. The obligation to fulfil also means that governments must take positive actions to identify vulnerable groups and implement policies to ensure their access to adequate food through facilitating their ability to feed themselves.</div> <bR> <div> In point of fact, only twenty countries in the world have constitutions, which, more or less explicitly and in more or less detail, refer to the Right-to-Food or a related norm. In a recent report published in 1999, the CESCR noted that the widespread failure by States and the international community to ensure freedom from hunger and enjoyment by all of the Right-to-Food constitutes one of the most serious shortcomings of the human rights agenda. The adoption of urgent measures is, therefore, required at the national, regional and international levels for the elimination of hunger and the creation of conditions in which all people can enjoy their Right-to-Food and nutrition. Unless this is done, the credibility of the human rights edifice is in serious doubt. Three key prerequisites for implementing the right to adequate food are generally recognized:</div> <bR> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">First and foremost is<I> political will </I>- without political acceptance of the Right-to-Food, the human rights agenda cannot make headway<I>; </I></div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Second,<I> </I>the state must have<I> the organizational and managerial capacity </I>to act on political will; and</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Third<I>, it is necessary to allocate and appropriately use the necessary resources </I>for implementing a rights agenda<I>. </I></div> <bR> <div> <I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700dc0000ff00.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">International Policy Commitments to Food Security</B></I><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > (section 5). In recent years, an increasing number of conventions, treaties, international mechanisms and Conferences have recognized the necessity of using the human rights framework to alleviate poverty and promote food security. In effect, among them, the Agenda 21, the World Food Summits, the UN Millennium Declaration, the World Declaration on Nutrition, the Food Aid Convention, and the UN Convention to Combat Desertification illustrate international concerns for food security. In particular:</FONT></div> <bR> <div> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#339933" FACE="Arial" ><I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The Agenda 21</B></I></FONT><B> </B>states that to meet food security challenges, major adjustments are needed in agricultural, environmental and macroeconomic policy, at both national and international levels, in developed as well as developing countries, to create the conditions for sustainable agriculture and rural development.</div> <bR> <div> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#339933" FACE="Arial" ><I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The 1996 World Food Summit</B></I><B>, </B></FONT>which sets forth seven commitments which laid the basis for achieving sustainable food security for all, and a Plan of Action spelling out the objectives and actions relevant for practical implementation of these seven commitments. In endorsing these seven commitments, Heads of State and Government signed to reduce the number of undernourished people to half their present level no later than 2015. They also recognized that sustainable progress in poverty eradication would be critical to improve access to food as well as the containment of conflicts, terrorism, corruption and environmental degradation, which also contribute significantly to food insecurity. These commitments were renewed in 2002 at the <I>World Food Summit: Five Years Later</I>, as progresses towards meeting the goals of the 1996 World Food Summit remained disappointingly slow.</div> <bR> <div> <I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The United Nations Millennium Declaration</B></I><B>,</B><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > which again set forth the commitment of 188 member states of the United Nations to halve, by the year 2015, the proportion of the world's people whose income is less than one dollar a day and the proportion of people who suffer from hunger and, by the same year, to halve the proportion of people who are unable to reach or to afford safe drinking water. These goals establish yardsticks for measuring results not just for developing countries, but also for the rich countries that help to fund development programs through bilateral aid programs and for the multilateral institutions, such as the World Bank, Regional development Banks, and UN Specialized Institutions, that help countries implement them.</FONT></div> <bR> <div> <I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The Food Aid Convention</B></I><B>,</B><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > which is a legal international agreement established in 1967 that lays down minimum annual food aid commitments, donor by donor, either in terms of total tonnage or market value and regulate food aid donations of individual EU member countries plus Argentina, Australia, Canada, Japan, Norway, Switzerland and the United States.</FONT></div> <bR> <div> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#339933" FACE="Arial" ><I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The UN Convention to Combat Desertification</B></I></FONT>, whose<I> </I>"bottom-up" approach is focused both combating desertification and land degradation worldwide and improving the living conditions of the most vulnerable segments of the population. The reason behind this dual approach is that desertification causes quite a large number of socio-economic disruptions, which are directly or indirectly linked to food insecurity and poverty.</div> <bR> <div> <I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700dc0000ff00.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Aid Institutions and their Commitments to Food Security</B></I> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" >(section 6). In parallel to the increasing international concerns for food security and poverty issues, an increasing number of United Nations agencies and other multilateral and bilateral aid agencies have recognized the necessity of addressing poverty as the main source of food insecurity. For those institutions, this has gone hand in hand with an increasing attention given to economic and social rights as being of equal value to civil and political rights. </FONT></div> <bR> <div> <I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)</B></I><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" >, which is the UN lead agency in matters relating to food and agriculture. It was notably the host of the World Food Conference in 1974, and the organizer of the World Food Summit in 1996 and the World Food Summit: Five Years Later in 2002. As such, FAO is playing a major role in the follow-up of the commitments made during these summits. The preamble to the FAO Constitution sets "ensuring humanity's freedom from hunger" as one of the basic purposes of the organization. One of the important bodies dealing with food security under FAO is the Committee on Food Security (CFS), whose concerns include the elimination of food insecurity wherever it may occur. Another FAO initiative is the Special Programme for Food Security (SPFS), which commenced its operations in late 1994. Its main objective is help low income food deficit countries (LIFDCs) to improve food security both at national and at household levels through rapid increases in food production and productivity, by reducing year-to-year variability in production and by improving people's access to food. In July 2001, the FAO Director-General Jacques Diouf established the FAO Trust Fund for Food Security and for Emergency Prevention of Transboundary Pests and Diseases of Animals and Plants to increase the flow of resources to fight hunger. Linked to this Trust Fund, FAO launched in 2002 a new initiative, the FAO Anti-Hunger Program on the premise that if the world now produces much more food than is required to provide everyone with an adequate diet, yet 800 million people - almost one person in seven - do not have enough to eat. Finally, FAO has established two food security information and early warning systems for food security. They include: (i) the FAO Global Information and Early Warning System on Food and Agriculture (GIEWS), which is a unique database on global, regional, national and sub-national food security situations, which is continuously refined and updated; and (ii) the Food Insecurity and Vulnerability Information and Mapping System (FIVIMS) aimed at providing a precise identification of the food-insecure or vulnerable groups - who they are, where they are located and the particular causes underlying their vulnerability - to improve the possibility of developing appropriate responses to those particular situations. Within these two mechanisms, FAO is now giving a particular attention to the impacts of the HIV/AIDS pandemic in SSA to food security.</FONT></div> <bR> <div> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#339933" FACE="Arial" ><I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The European Commission (EC)</B></I></FONT><I>,</I> which completely revised its food security programme in 1996. Regulation (EC) No 1292/96 defines the current legal framework of the Commission's food security strategy. It acknowledges the multidimensional nature of food security and the fight against poverty. It incorporates food security into policies for sustainable development and poverty reduction, since the fight against food insecurity is one of the main levels for poverty reduction. Reducing the vulnerability of poor population groups involves identifying them properly and having a better understanding if the strategies used by them to confront food crisis. Furthermore, the Regulation identifies three main types of aid related to food security: first, food aid, where operations are mainly short-term; second, operations in support of food security, which include long-term operations designed to ensure sustainable food security; and third, operations to improve early warning systems and storage programmes. EC activities related to food aid and food security are currently administered by both ECHO (food aid) and EuropeAid (food security). In addition, the Commission recently introduced the new concept linking relief, rehabilitation and development (LRRD).</div> <bR> <div> For implementation of the European Food Aid and Food Security policy, timely information is needed by ECHO and EuropeAid on the food and crop situation, notably in countries stricken by food shortage, wars, natural disasters or other factors leading to food insecurity. To respond to this need, the Joint Research Centre's (JRC) MARS Unit is organising a system for monitoring and forecasting crop prospects in different parts of the world in the framework of the Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES) initiative. Data from satellite (Spot-VGT) and Global Meteorological Models are already processed on a regular basis and advanced tools and models for crop yield monitoring and forecasting are being developed. This work is done in close collaboration with European partners and FAO. The MARS Unit mainly provides technical support to the Agriculture DG, the Enlargement DG, the External Relations DG and AIDCO and to the Member States. </div> <bR> <div> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#339933" FACE="Arial" ><I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The World Food Program</B></I><B> (WFP)</B></FONT>, which is the United Nations frontline agency in the fight against global hunger, notably to provide food aid in case of food emergencies, natural disasters and/or conflicts. In 2001, WFP fed 77 million people in 82 countries, including most of the world's refugees and internally displaced people. Under the WFP, food aid is provided through three specific programs: <I>food for life</I> in case of emergencies; <I>food for growth</I> targeting needy people at the most critical times of their lives; and <I>food for work</I> to promote self-reliance through food-for-work projects. In terms of early warning and food security information systems, the WFP has also established a Vulnerability Analysis and Mapping Unit (VAM), which was set up for continually assessing the food security and vulnerability status of WFP beneficiaries. </div> <bR> <div> <I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The World Health Organization</B></I><B> (WHO</B><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" >), which is providing, through six regional nutrition programs, both technical and financial support to member countries for the development, strengthening and implementation of national nutrition plans of action.</FONT></div> <bR> <div> <I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The World Bank</B></I><B> (IBRD)</B><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" >, which has recently recognized that the human rights approach to nutrition is an important new narrative of the international development discourse. It has, however, only recently begun to explore the implications of the human rights framework for its work. Support for governance reform and support for equitable economic growth are two aspects of the Bank's comprehensive approach to poverty alleviation, which is intended to strengthen the human rights culture. With regards food security, the Bank's intention is to remain focused on action to combat poverty, notably working with countries and partner agencies to significantly increase the global resources allocated to nutrition. Within this framework, the Bank is currently taking action to incorporate nutritional issues into agriculture and rural development projects and food policy reform and ensure that nutrition is part of the design of poverty alleviation programs. Within the Bank, food security issues are spread over three thematic programs - Agriculture and Rural Development, Poverty Alleviation and Health, Nutrition and Population - and one thematic network.</FONT></div> <bR> <div> In 2001, the Bank sets up a new multi-donor trust fund to support capacity building in low-income countries that are undertaking poverty reduction strategies. The fund is intended to strengthen the preparation and implementation of national poverty reduction strategy papers (PRSPs). However, from a Bank perspective (as specified in the 2003 World Development Report), environment and social problems (including food security) are not easy to diagnose when there is a lack of reliable, current and geographically disaggregated information. For many important aspects of the social sphere and the environment, society lacks the detailed data to monitor, diagnose and manage the problems at local and national levels: for example and for most countries, reliable, up-to-date, spatially disaggregated information is lacking on poverty and many other social concerns (health, food security, education, crime). These data gaps inhibit the understanding of - and consensus to - the impacts of policy reforms, national and international, on poverty in the developing world. They also impede the formulation and execution of strategies to alleviate poverty. </div> <bR> <div> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#339933" FACE="Arial" ><I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The International Fund for Agriculture Development (IFAD)</B></I></FONT><I>, </I>which has been created to focus on rural poverty reduction, work with poor rural populations (notably poor women) to eliminate poverty, hunger and malnutrition; raise productivity and incomes; and improve the quality of their lives. The Fund has designed and implemented grant-financed projects in very different natural, socio-economic and cultural environments in the world with a particular focus on remote areas, and the poorest and most deprived segments of the rural population. IFAD has recognized that vulnerable groups can and do contribute to economic growth. These groups have shown that they can join the mainstream of social and economic development; provided the causes of their poverty are understood and enabling conditions are created. As part of IFAD's Strategic Framework for Action, the development and dissemination of sustainable agricultural technologies is a major objective of IFAD's grant programme. Improved farming systems require that technology focus on conservation and, where feasible, the upgrading of the natural resources that the poor use. An important vehicle for reaching this objective is the IFAD's grant-financed research, which is currently working on improving partnerships in adaptive research programmes to increase developmental impacts, notably with Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR).</div> <bR> <div> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#339933" FACE="Arial" ><I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The World Trade Organization (WTO)</B></I></FONT><I>,</I> which has an important role to play to achieve the common objective of global food security. In effect, for the WTO, food security is dependent on national agricultural production, access to international markets and the availability of foreign exchange to buy food imports and poverty rather than a lack of global food production is the root cause of food insecurity. Therefore, for the WTO, reducing or eliminating trade-distorting subsidies and improving market access opportunities, particularly on the part of developed countries will help boost domestic production and thus farmers' income where food can be produced most efficiently, including in many developing countries, where problems of food security are endemic and where production is currently suppressed due to subsidized import competition. However, the WTO round of agricultural negotiations stated at Doha in 2001 collapsed at Cancun in November 2003 due diverging views on global agricultural trade policies between industrialized and developing countries and among developing countries.</div> <bR> <div> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#339933" FACE="Arial" ><I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI-CGIAR)</B></I></FONT><I>,</I> which focuses on research to help foster sustainable economic growth and combat poverty through better government policies. Aiming at reducing hunger and malnutrition, IFPRI's interest extends to social, economic and institutional forces that drive the food sector and bear on the development process. IFPRI is in a special position to conduct and promote research and policy to promote the right to adequate food from a human rights perspective. In 1993, IFPRI, in collaboration with partners around the world, launched an initiative called <I>A 2020 Vision for Food, Agriculture, and the Environment</I>. The main impetus for this initiative was the prevalence of considerable disagreement on the magnitude and nature of the world's food and environmental problems combined with complacency that global food surpluses were a sufficient guarantee of global food security. The lack of a long-term vision and consensus about what actions are required for feeding the world, reducing poverty, and protecting the natural resource base spurred IFPRI to launch the 2020 Vision initiative.</div> <bR> <div> <I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Bilateral Aid Organizations</B></I><B>.</B><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > Food security, poverty, natural disasters, conflicts, international migration and globalisation are, nowadays, at the core of the bilateral development cooperation and the way it is organised. From the late 1990s, these complex issues and new commitments taken as a result of the 1996 WFS and the 2000 Millennium Declaration have required bilateral aid agencies to thoroughly reformulated their policies and well managed operations, which have been adapted to changing circumstances in a world in turmoil. Not all bilateral aid agencies subscribe equally to all these new development and act on them, but few reject any of them explicitly and categorically, perhaps because there are already embedded in formal policy guidelines used by the UN system, the World bank and the IMF and the EU.</FONT></div> <bR> <div> Traditionally, bilateral aid agencies have attached a leading importance to the agricultural and rural sectors of developing countries. However, during the past decade, the official development aid (ODA) to agriculture sharply declined, as the vital role of agriculture for food security was not just reflected in a comparable flow of foreign resources for its development. As a result is difficult to reconcile the apparent contradiction between the recognized of agriculture and rural development for food security and poverty alleviation on one hand and the declining resources directed at them on the other. Some of the possible reasons may have to do with the relative abundance of food in the world at declining prices; the perceived high potential of agriculture to respond to technological opportunities, even in the absence of substantial investment; the inherent complexity of agriculture and rural development projects, especially in relation to their environmental implications; and the widely held views within aid agencies that agricultural ad rural development projects are risky and generate lower rates of return than other types of projects (despite recent evidence to the contrary).</div> <bR> <div> <I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Non Governmental Organizations (NGOs)</B></I><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" >, which are now is also playing a crucial role in advancing freedom from hunger and the right to adequate food. Non-governmental human rights organizations have for a long time concentrated mainly on civil and political rights, whereas non-governmental development organizations have given little attention to human rights. In recent years however, this has changed. Many NGOs are now well aware that the promotion of the right to food requires a clear redefinition of the basic concepts of economics, social and cultural rights, poverty and food security that focus only or mostly on agricultural productivity and harvest yield. NGOs took a great interest in the World Food Summit. More than 1,000 organizations from more than 80 countries attended the parallel NGO Forum during the Summit. One of their demands was the preparation of a code of conduct or "voluntary guidelines" for promoting the right to food and food security. From an operational perspective, many NGOs are now involved in food aid distribution in famine-prone countries, notably those affected by natural disasters, internal strife and conflicts.</FONT></div> <bR> <div> <I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700dc0000ff00.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Regional Cooperation in and Commitments to Food Security in SSA</B></I><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > (section 7). One regional and three regional development mechanisms and institutions with distinct food security initiatives were created in SSA during these two decades. All these regional and sub-regional mechanisms have in common the development of specific thematic institutions and food security initiatives, generally supported by the donor community (multi-lateral and/or bilateral).</FONT></div> <bR> <div> <I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD</B></I><B>)</B><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" >. The NEPAD strategic framework arises from a mandate given to the five initiating Heads of State by the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) to develop an integrated socio-economic development framework for Africa. As a result, the NEPAD was created to address the current challenges facing the African continent. Issues such as the escalating poverty levels, underdevelopment and the continued marginalisation of Africa, need a new radical intervention, spearheaded by African leaders, to develop a new Vision that would guarantee Africa's development. With regard to food security, NEPAD is currently working with the Global Environment Facility (GEF), the World Bank, the African Development Bank and other bilateral Donor Agencies to address the Africa agricultural natural resources bases and with the CGIAR and the Africa Forum for Agricultural Research (FARA) to address agricultural research capacity issues. </FONT></div> <bR> <div> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#339933" FACE="Arial" ><I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The Southern Africa Development Community</B></I><B> (SADC)</B></FONT>. The main objective of the SADC, grouping 14 Southern African countries, is to harmonise the political and socio-economic policies and plans of member states and to mobilise the people of the region and their institutions to develop economic, social and cultural ties across the region, and to fully participate in the implementation of its programmes and projects. The SADC has initiated in 1993 a strategy comprising three major cross-cutting programmes, namely food security, agricultural and natural resources development to increase agricultural productivity and overall output, thereby contributing to improvements in food security at the household, national and regional level; foster the efficient development, utilisation and conservation of natural resources; improve the capacity of agriculture to transform national economies; and improve the standards of living of rural populations by stimulating increases in income and employment through the efficient and sustainable use of agricultural and natural resources. Within the DADC, three institutions are dealing with food security issues at a regional level, namely, the <I>SADC Drought Monitoring Centre (DMC)</I>, the <I>SADC Regional Early Warning System</I> (REWS) and the <I>Southern African Regional Climate Outlook Forum (SARCOF),</I> which is a regional seasonal weather outlook prediction and application process adopted by the fourteen SADC countries;</div> <bR> <div> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#339933" FACE="Arial" ><I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD)</B></I></FONT><I>. </I>IGAD's mission is to achieve regional cooperation and economic integration through promotion of food security, sustainable environmental management, peace and security, intra-regional trade and development of improved communications infrastructure in eastern Africa. For IGAD's food security institutions, the long-term objective is to ensure that all people in the region have access to sufficient food at all times for a healthy and productive life, without destroying the natural resource base and the environment. In a nutshell, IGAD's Food Security Strategy should generate benefits for the economy of the region by: (i) improving food production, food quality and standards; (ii) strengthening intra-regional trade; (iii) creating food surplus for export; (iv) harmonizing working policies in the region, and (v) strengthening the capacity of member states in food technologies and negotiations. Three projects, currently initiated by IGAD are relevant to food security and Food Security Information Services in the IGAD region. They include: (i) <I>Strengthening of Remote Sensing Applications for Food Security Early Warning and Environmental Monitoring; </I>(ii) the establishment of a<I> Regional Integrated Information System (RIIS) aimed at </I>enhancing the production and dissemination of timely and reliable information in the IGAD region; and (iii) the development of an <I>Environmental Information System on the Internet (EISI.</I></div> <bR> <div> <I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a00dc33993300.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The Permanent Committee for Drought Control in Sahelian Countries (CILSS)</B></I><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" >. Within the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the CILSS mandate is to “invest into the research for food security and in the struggle against the effects of drought and desertification in order to achieve a new ecological equilibrium” in the Sahel. CILSS activities related to food security are either developed and implemented by the CILSS itself or by two specialised institutions, namely INSAH and AGRHYMET. Within this framework, two initiatives are worth to mention: (i) the PRESAO Process and (ii) the AP3A project, which are both implemented by the AGRHYMET Center in Niamey. The aim of the PRESAO Process is to provide decision-makers and users of climate seasonal prediction and information with a tool for decision-making and strategic planning in climate related activities. The AP3A project or Early Warning and Crop Yield Forecasting is a three year project aimed at assisting CILSS countries in contributing to improved food security early warning and information systems at national and regional level.</FONT></div> <bR> <div> <I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700dc00000000.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"> </B></I><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#FF0000" FACE="Arial" ><I><B>International Commitments to Famine EWS and FSIS</B></I> (</FONT>section 8). The need for adequate information on food security at the global, national and sub-national levels was first stressed at the World Food Conference in 1974, which prompted the establishment of the FAO Global Information and Early Warning System (GIEWS). Alike, the ambitious World Food Summit goal in 1996 included a commitment to establish national food security and vulnerability information and mapping systems (FIVIMS). The rationale behind the development of EWS and FSIS was based on the fact that baseline information on:  “… <I>who the food insecure are, how many they are, what their characteristics are (location, livelihood systems, access to resources, age, gender, etc.), the nature of their food insecurity (structural, transitory, or both), and the depth of their under-nutrition”</I> was and still is generally lacking. Since then, many international forum (such as the <I>World Summit on Sustainable Development</I>) and conferences, generally organized under the <I>International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR)</I>, called for a greater commitment to the development and strengthening of famine EWS and food security information networks. For instance, the 1998 Potsdam Early Warning Conference specifically adopted a resolution that, since early warning and information systems represent a cornerstone of disaster reduction, they should become a key element of future disaster reduction strategies for the 21st Century. For its part, the EC Council Regulation No 1292/96 of 27 June 1996 on food-aid policy and food-aid management and special operations in support of food security states that operations in support to food security should, <I>inter-alia,</I> include (Art 23): … <I>the strengthening or, in exceptional cases, the establishment of national and international early warning systems. The measures financed under this item may include studies, the establishment of infrastructures, etc</I>..</div> <bR> <div> <I><B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700dc0000ff00.gif" HEIGHT="15" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Preliminary Policy Conclusions and Operational Implications for the GMFS</B></I><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > (Section 8). As highlighted in this report, significant progresses have been made during the past decade on the food security policy front. Since the legendary drought of the 1960s and the 1970s in the Sahel, food security has moved away from the simplistic notion of food supply being the only cause of food insecurity to assessing the vulnerability of particular groups in terms of their access to food. Three main reasons are behind this move: first, food supply (or food production) is a necessary, but not a sufficient condition for adequate nutrition, the other conditions being care and health; second, it is misleading to treat food security as a fundamental need independently of wider livelihood conditions, and third, the sensitivity, resilience and sustainability of livelihood systems should be considered crucial for the identification of vulnerable groups in terms of their access to food. As a result, the use and integration of socio-economic indicators with food supply indicators are becoming of utmost importance to food security information systems.</FONT></div> <bR> <div> Aside from a renewed international policy and strategic commitment to the WFS' and MDG's goals, the majority of global frameworks and multilateral and bilateral aid organizations are now recognizing that information gathering on factors affecting food security and/or inducing hunger and famine are essential and, therefore, should be financially-supported and improved. Such frameworks and institutions also recognize that EWS and FSIS are important policy-making elements to efficiently address food security and poverty issues as well as, more generally, disasters prevention and management. More effective mechanisms are, therefore, needed to Integrate famine EWS and FSIS into national development processes and public policies and raise awareness of the role of famine EWS and FSIS in vulnerability and poverty reduction, promote the integration of famine EWS into relevant sustainable development agendas and policies, and humanitarian assistance; motivate long-term political commitment to EWS and FSIS, particularly through the demonstration of benefit/cost relationships and other value assessments of early warning services; disseminate new thinking and techniques on such things as vulnerability and risk assessment strategies, space-based and field data collection and management and sector specific approaches to famine early warning, and stimulate and support institutional capacity building in regional and national EWS and FSIS settings and the training of officials at all levels. </div> <bR> <div> These recommendations not only apply to but also justify the GMFS project as there is an urgent need to strengthen national food security information and famine early warning systems in SSA to provide timely and preventive information that predict and detect problems of food security at national and local levels before they translate into food shortages or health problems. This implies the availability of a great variety of locational information from different sources, including environmental, management and political data. For this purpose, the focus of the GMFS project should be on the local causes of the failure of the food system, as well as on services that give an early warning of developing problems at the national and local levels. </div> <bR> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <TABLE BORDER="2" CELLPADDING="1" CELLSPACING="1" WIDTH="536" BORDERCOLORLIGHT="#C0C0C0" BORDERCOLORDARK="#808080" FRAME="BOX" RULES="ALL" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" > <tR> <tD VALIGN=TOP HEIGHT= 255 WIDTH="526"><div> Africa' importance for global security has risen dramatically in recent years. Africa has served as a staging-post for terrorist attacks both within the continent and in the Middle East. West Africa's development prospects have brightened with the discoveries of off-shore oil and gas reserves that could supply quite a large amount of industrialized countries hydrocarbon imports within a decade. Yet the orderly and transparent development of these reserves is threatened by violence and instability. In addition, poverty, hunger and diseases leave the region vulnerable to security and humanitarian disasters.</div> <bR> <div> Direct military efforts and short-term humanitarian aid will not achieve long-term security when Africa's underlying crisis of hunger, poverty, diseases and building youth population remain unaddressed. Indeed under today's conditions, a growing military presence in Africa could easily provoke a backlash. Yet when it comes to development assistance to prevent conflict, there is almost no money to be found.</div> <bR> <div> In every aspect of Africa's complex plight, an ounce of prevention will be worth a ton of treatment.</div> <bR> <div> <I>Free quotation from the Economist: Doing the sums on Africa, May 22, 2004</I></div> </tD> </tR> </TABLE></div> <bR> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>