Five years after UN summit, number of world's hungry unchanged

ROME -- Five years after the U.N. World Food Summit promised to halve the number of hungry people by 2015, the follow-up summit opens today with no significant change in that number -- 800 million.

Heads of state and ministers attending the four-day meeting are expected to recommit themselves to reducing the number of hungry to 400 million.

But they also will be asked to make good on those promises this time around.

Jacques Diouf, director-general of the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization that is hosting the summit, said the world produces more than enough food to feed its 6 billion people.

The issue, he said, is getting that food to the hungriest.

Starvation risks

"We cannot consider nowadays -- with the possibility of daily telecommunications, transport, Internet, TVs and so on -- that people can in some places be wealthy, be rich, and in other parts of the world people are in a situation of starvation," Diouf said.

For example, about 12.8 million people in six African countries are at risk of starving because of drought, floods, government mismanagement and economic instability, according to the United Nations.

Their plight is expected to figure prominently in the speeches by the more than 100 world leaders attending the summit at FAO's headquarters here.

The other likely topics of discussion include access to markets for poor farmers and the use of genetically modified foods, both hotly disputed by environmental and farmers rights groups, who opened a parallel food summit on Rome's outskirts over the weekend.

Under heavy security in Rome Saturday, tens of thousands of demonstrators voiced their concern about genetically altered foods and other environmental issues.

The United States has been a major advocate of genetically engineered foods, arguing that the creation of drought- and insect-resistant crops ensures greater food security -- a goal of the FAO.

But opponents say engineered crops pose environmental and health hazards and are designed to benefit the multinational corporations that develop them, not farmers or consumers.

U.S. Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman, who is heading the U.S. delegation, blamed the debate on a lack of consumer understanding about the benefits of biotechnology.

"We are already seeing new products being developed that could help some of the more food-deficit regions of the world," she said, citing drought-resistant corn and Vitamin A-enriched rice.

Another divisive issue is trade, with advocacy groups saying poor farmers are at a disadvantage under international trade policies.

Trading practices ostensibly designed to open markets instead have put farmers out of business in the developing world because they cannot compete with subsidized imports from the United States and Europe, they say.

"Hunger can increase even if there are cheap imports," said Michael Windfuhr, head of the German-based Food First, Information and Action Network human rights group and member of the non-governmental coalition at the summit.

"Farmers lose their access to land, and then they have no income."

Windfuhr also said one of the most contentious issues going into the summit was whether its final, nonbinding resolution would include a call for developing a voluntary code of conduct on "the right to adequate food for all."

The European Union, the Vatican and developing countries within the Group of 77 block endorsed the concept, but the United States remains opposed, he said.

While Washington is a top contributor to U.N. food relief efforts, it would be difficult for it to endorse the right of all to food while still maintaining an economic embargo against Cuba, Windfuhr said.