2005 World Food Day Teleconference
Concept paper

Our theme this World Food Day, Reflections on Fighting Hunger: Roads Not Taken; Goals Not Met; The Journey Ahead, couldn’t be more timely. October 16, 2005 is the 60th anniversary of the founding of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the 25th anniversary of World Food Day. And it comes at a time that hunger and poverty have risen on the world agenda.

The theme will trace, therefore, the 60-year fight for food security for all, which began in earnest in the dark days of World War ll. It can be argued that never before in the postwar period has there been either a more propitious moment to attack hunger effectively or a more dangerous moment to let the issue slide. The continued existence of large numbers of dispossessed people, especially in the wake of the communications revolution that lets them know their status in the world, is a major flashpoint.

Earlier this year, the rich nations, the G-8, met in Scotland to consider debt relief for very poor nations. The final outcome on this and other issues considered at Scotland still awaits definitive action by the industrialized world, but the situation is promising.

In the year 2000, world leaders from all 189 United Nations member states scheduled a worldwide meeting at UN headquarters this September to review achievement of newly established world development goals. Most of the Eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), starting with the eradication of poverty and hunger, were benchmarked for the period 1990 to 2015. They promised "clear and measurable improvements on standards prevailing in 1990 by the end of 2015."

What the world community is being forced to confront is the continued existence of more than 800 million hungry people worldwide at a time when more than enough food is produced to feed everyone. Hunger is universally understood and the plight of the undernourished individual is obvious.

What has happened over the past 60 years? The UN system has established a variety of collateral organizations, starting with FAO’s founding in 1945. In addition, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) have built up independent research, expertise and relief and development programs around the world. Freewheeling globalization has lifted significant numbers of Chinese and Indians out of abject poverty, and modern transportation has the capacity to put food in reach for virtually everyone. Further, immense wealth that could pay for it all has been created in recent years.

Then In the late 1940s, the Cold War began to wipe out post-war optimism about a united, peaceful world order. U.S. foreign aid focused on European reconstruction and became a boon for U.S. grain exporters. Even tobacco was part of Washington’s Food for Peace program.

After 60 years, the overarching consideration of food issues and policies remains the same: What has been effective? What hasn’t? The number of undernourished people in the developing world dropped from 900 million in 1970 to roughly 800 million in 1995. The proverbial measuring glass is half full, some argue, considering that the population of Less Developed Countries (LDCs) grew during the same period by about 1.8 billion.

Critics contend that "half full" just isn’t good enough. Direct action must be taken for the hungry. Further, they say, the world is backsliding. In FAO’s State of Food Insecurity in the World (2004), the number of chronically undernourished people rose by 18 million during 2002-2004.

Recent reductions in the number of hungry people, critics point out, are centered in two countries: China and India. Yet, the two population billionaires have assets that most small countries don’t have. What about small African nations that can’t grow sufficient food to feed their population or earn enough foreign exchange to close the gap with imported food?

This year’s World Food Day theme will review the 60-year fight against hunger with a look at perspectives, from the conventional to the visionary, on how we may improve actions and policies. The Study/Action Packet seeks fresh insights on roads not taken, goals not met and changes that might be made for the journey ahead. In broad brushstrokes, it will lay out many of the points of conflict over world food policies.

Two basic approaches, often at odds, have existed from the outset. One calls for a holistic food policy rooted in the needs of undernourished people and their immediate problems; the other espouses a globalized commercial food system that eventually would bring the fruits of modernity to the bypassed millions. These approaches overlap and are evolving; neither represents a stand-alone solution to world hunger.

The theme touches on many of the choices that dominated hunger issues over recent decades: the Green Revolution vs. ecological caution; population growth vs. family planning; transnational corporations vs. social equity; earth’s limits vs. increased exploitation; consumerism vs. environmentalism; fast food vs. diet for a small planet; genetic modification vs. organic foods; intellectual property rights vs. access rights; debt relief vs. repayment obligations; promised foreign aid vs. foreign aid "fatigue;" trade vs. fair trade.

In addition, the theme looks at such issues as human rights and the role of women. Noted are individuals who have influenced the course of the world food debate. Here are several points of discussion that may emerge from the telecast’s dialogue:

• What role, if any, could genetically modified crops play in poor countries?
• If large nations like China, India and Brazil develop rapidly, how can the industrialized nations reasonably ask them to slow down for the sake of earth’s environment?
• How has globalization affected the fight for food security?
• Why do we have more than 800 million chronically undernourished people in a world that produces enough food for all?
• What can civil society do to strengthen the commitment to the right to food?
• How can the world work together to forge the same level of unity and action to end hunger that the allied nations exhibited in winning World War II?