U.N., Islamic Bank Make $1B Farming Deal

Funding to Support Agriculture in Developing Countries Announced as Food Summit Kicks Off

(AP)  Funding from an Islamic bank will help develop agriculture in poor countries, a U.N. food agency said ahead of a summit to discuss the so-far elusive goal of reducing the number of hungry people in the world.

The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization, which is hosting the three-day summit starting Monday, said it had reached a deal with the Islamic Development Bank for $1 billion in funding to help develop agriculture in poor countries that belong to both organizations.

"This agreement comes at a critical moment, when the international community recognizes it has neglected agriculture for many years," the Rome-based agency said Sunday. "Today, sustained investment in agriculture — especially small-holder agriculture — is acknowledged as the key to food security."

Organizers of the gathering, to be attended by some 60 heads of state, agriculture ministers and other officials, hope to wean national policies away from long-standing emphasis on food aid and instead generate support for a new approach: help farmers, livestock herders and fishermen to produce enough food for their own people.

U.N. officials point to villages in Kenya, Pakistan and Haiti to show this is possible.

In one Kenyan village, for example, an irrigation project is credited with not only reducing hunger there, but also allowing farmers to produce enough rice to sell surplus to the U.N. World Food Agency to help feed African's hungry.

But past U.N. food summits have so far failed to meet their stated goals, including to halve the number of the world's hungry by 2015.

U.N. officials recently put the number of hungry at 1.02 billion, or roughly one out of every six people on the planet.

The last summit in June 2008 concentrated on how climate change and soaring food prices were undermining food security.

A draft declaration for this week's summit would commit world leaders to the new strategy to increase agricultural development aid. But it does not include a 2025 deadline for eradicating hunger — a goal sought by the United Nations.

Also missing are specific funding pledges, such as the $44 billion in yearly agricultural aid that the Food and Agriculture Organization says will be needed in coming decades.

Some critics were calling for other approaches. The international agency Oxfam said Sunday that "money alone will not solve the problem," and suggested instead that the U.N. could drastically reduce the 24,000 hunger-related deaths tallied daily around the globe if it was allowed by countries to coordinate their various initiatives.

Without such coordination, "all the different initiatives do not add up to a single effective, coherent and accountable whole," Oxfam report author Chris Leather said in a statement.

The London-based think tank International Policy Network complained that the "real causes of hunger and food insecurity are not even on the agenda" for the summit, and cited restrictions on trade between and within countries as a factor undermining agricultural investments.

Trade subsidies as well as wealthy nations' purchasing quotas to boost their own farmers are also often cited as factors frustrating efforts to fight hunger.

The think tank noted that, despite past summit commitments to slash the number of hungry, "there are more hungry people now than in 2002 when they held their first summit."

Pope Benedict XVI will lend his moral authority to hunger-fighting efforts with an address Monday morning.

After dusk on Sunday, Rome lit up the Colosseum in a sign of solidarity with the hunger-fighting efforts.

[solidoak]

If there really is a shortage of food in certain countries, and if there really is a hunger problem, look to those leaders who are despots in those countries. That is where the problem lies, and the U.N. will only be subsidizing these despots to stay in power. The beat goes on.

[tmittelstaed]

There are more hungry people today because there are more people, period. The problem is that far too many of these cultures regard birth control as evil. If the Pope wants to lend his authority to fighting hunger, he should announce that the Catholic Church no longer opposes artificial birth control. (ie: condoms)

What has always happened in the past is that as soon as agricultural output increases in one of these areas with high hunger, the population increases, thus totally negating any gains made with agriculture. A region only grows enough food to support 1000 people, the people in that region breed 1500 people with 500 of them dying of malnutrition. You jack up agricultural output to support 1500 people and the people there then breed 2000 people, and your no better off than before.

The Pope needs to go stick his nose elsewhere, the Catholic Church has done enough damage with their "sex-is-only-for-procreation" baloney. Until Priests are allowed to marry again, the Catholic Church simply doesn't get it.

[rbichamp]

Why no mention of Islam? Those countries are just as bad but you only want to attack Christianity as you're a coward.

You better not say anything bad about Islam or you might get blown up!

[U_S_Drug_Addict]

Oh please, Religion wont feed anyone...