Why are more than 800 million people chronically undernourished in a period of astonishing worldwide wealth creation? Why can't our increasingly powerful and interconnected international food system deal more equitably and effectively with all of humankind? With world food production sufficient to meet everyone's daily needs, the questions become more pointed. Many observers tacitly assume that the hunger problem is so deep, so multifaceted and so expensive that it defies solution in our time. With globalization putting in place a worldwide economic and social system, it is vitally important that hunger not be taken as insoluble and quietly institutionalized as a lost cause.

In many ways globalization has created a world food system that is a modern marvel. Food produced and processed in far-off places is readily available in our grocery stores in the industrialized world; new techniques for storing and packaging food provide fresher and more attractive products; labor-saving mechanized agriculture makes food cheaper and more abundant; and scientific research produces gene-altered animals and plants.

The critical problem of the emerging world food system is how the modern sector of the rich is to work with the traditional sector of the developing-country poor. At the macro level intergovernmental organizations, multinational corporations, investors and speculators are changing pell mell the micro level where food-poor individuals depend on staples and farming for their meager existence.

Globalization is quickly spreading a capital-intensive, export-minded, high-technology food system into the world of the very poor. On the surface it appears to be inexorable "progress" but there are questions to be asked. How will this system affect the poorest of the poor people engaged in subsistence agriculture who constitute a majority of the chronic hungry?

Food, clearly, is a daily biological necessity. The food system, therefore, isn't just a business, a trade item or high-tech science. Rather it is the provider of human existence. Is the globalized world food system taking into account a poor person's limited ability to grow food, buy food, have a real voice in food policy, count on a safety net in case of need and benefit from agricultural research?

Our theme this year is World Food System: Serving All or Serving Some? Any consideration of the food system must start with the plight of those who need food the most. The chronically hungry face daunting inequalities: poverty, unemployment, lack of education, access to credit, land and political participation. In addition many of the chronically hungry suffer from illness and lack of medical services. They often experience racial, gender and social exclusion and are vulnerable to wars, natural disasters and epidemics. The poorest of the poor are beyond the easy reach of traditional capitalism.

One thing is clear: the present world food system has failed the hungry and many people believe that the evolving globalized system as presently constituted holds too little promise. The most recent world survey of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimates that "792 million people in 98 developing countries are not getting enough food to lead normal, healthy and active lives." Another 34 million in industrialized nations, mostly in the late Soviet Union and its former, satellites, experience a similar fate. Malnutrition, the World Health Organization (WHO) points out, "kills, maims, retards, cripples, blinds and impairs human development on a truly massive scale worldwide."

At the World Food Summit in 1996 leaders from 186 countries promised to reduce the number of chronically undernourished people in developing countries form 800 million to 400 million by 2015. At the time, many observers decried this goal as far too low. But even this effort is woefully behind schedule.   Further, environmental degradation and continued population increases threaten the theoretical balance between world food production and consumption. As a result heads of state will again meet at a World Food Summit - Five Years Later in Rome in November to recommit to the promises of the 1996 Summit

The teleconference Study/Action Packet provides an overview of the multifaceted world food system from five perspectives:

TRAGIC TRAP - How abject poverty, second-class citizenship, natural disasters, constraining national circumstances and wars trap the developing-country poor.

SYSTEMIC INFLUENCES - How such institutions as the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, globalization and the info-tech revolution affect the world food system.

VOICES OF THE POOR - How disenfranchised people view their plight, including testimony from the poor.

ARENAS FOR ACTION - Where advocates of change work to make a difference at the international, national, local and individual levels.

PEOPLE POWER - How concerned citizens have made a difference through microfinance initiatives, debt relief and AIDS treatment campaigns.

Two visions of the future of the world food system are presented. One holds that food must be considered a human right and that economic and social policy should work directly toward that end. The other contends that globalization's creation of wealth is the road to eventual food security for all. One favors the microeconomics of dealing immediately with the problems of the poor. The other advocates the macroeconomics of a free market system.

Participants at sites are asked to consider the implications of the two visions and what course of action they would advocate. If food is taken as an inalienable human right, how is this to be effectively implemented to serve all? What would be the motivating economic factors for world society to share available food with 800 million poor and hungry people? What part can the communication revolution play in creating a climate of worldwide reform of the food system?

Capitalism is based on profit. Should free market polices be expected to shape the fast-evolving world food system which bypasses one out six people on earth? Do rich countries offer sufficient foreign aid? Are globalized systems fair? How can the poor organize to help themselves? How could high-tech firms bring the fruits of new technologies to the grassroots?

 What should be expected of developing-country governments?  Despite the progress of democracy in recent years, poor people's aspirations are still hobbled by authoritarianism, corruption, maladministration, elites, bias and economic neglect. What can the average citizen do about world hunger? Is lobbying local and national governments and the UN system, and contributing time and money to charity and action groups enough? World citizen power created a global treaty to outlaw landmines. Could hunger be similarly outlawed? What new strategies and techniques are required for civil society to change the system?

In sum, the theme this year encourages us to learn more about the world food system and challenges us to make judgments and seek solutions that will make the system more people centered.