Ban tells US students about challenges of food security

Early last week on June 15, Secretary-General of the United Nations Ban Ki-Moon told a gathering at St. Louis University in Missouri about the “bottom billion,” the one billion people around the world who live on less than $1 a day, many of whom are children suffering from starvation and malnutrition.

The talk about food security at the American University was part of the Secretary-General’s campaign to increase awareness of the UN and its goals to promote peace, security, development and human rights. Besides St. Louis, Ban has paid visits to other cities including Jackson Hole, Chicago and Atlanta.

Ban mentioned the effect of souring food prices on the bottom billion who already spend two-thirds of their income on food. With staple food costs doubling in the time span of a few months just last year, the daily reality for one third of the world’s population include choosing which of their children gets to eat, and which don’t.

“No one should face such choices,” said Mr. Ban. “No one should face such privation, not in a world of such wealth.”

The Secretary-General said that many families can’t afford to eat two meals a day and end up eating only one. Ban explained how children’s growth becomes stunted because of a lack of nutrition and become too weak to learn. As families spend more of their income on food, less goes into health and education, leading to a downward spiral for the whole society.

Because of this negative trend, Ban believes the issue of food security requires immediate attention. He stresses areas of focus including the need to strengthen agricultural infrastructure, increase productivity and remove unfair terms of trade.

“It is good that the UN’s World Food Programme [WFP] enjoys excellent ties with the United States and its farmers,” said Ban. “It’s impossible to think we can succeed without the support of the United States.”

-- Jaimie Hwang

Source: UN News Centre

or, Create a Petition

Change.org

Fair Trade to Fight Poverty

According to a case study of coffee producers in Bolivia, fair trade has the potential to make a significant impact on the anti-poverty effort. The report goes into detail about the effects of fair trade. For instance, fair trade has the potential to reduce poverty by providing competition at the level of the intermeriaries and enabling capacity-building. As a result of its poverty-reducing impact, it may have a "positive influence on conflict prevention by contributing to a reverse of cultural inequalities." Fair trade has also influenced several trends in the non-fair trade market, and thus, it may have indirectly been responsible for reducing poverty for some producers in this market. You can read the summary and the full report here (PDF).

SMART Aid

The ONE Campaign has, for a while now, been on the front lines of the debate about the effectiveness of aid. Contrary to what Dambisa Moyo's book says about development assisance, ONE believes that aid should be improved and increased. As a guideline, they have come up with "SMART aid," a list of attributes that would make aid effective in fighting global poverty:

S - Sufficient in scale to achieve its intended goals.
M -Measurable so taxpayers and recipients can see results and monitor progress over time.
A - Accountable to the citizens of developing nations.
R - Responsive to the specific needs of the citizens for whom it is intended.
T - Transparent, to allow scrutiny by civil society and the media.

Read more on the ONE website.

Global Food Security Act of 2009

The Global Food Security Act of 2009, S. 384, will authorize appropriations for fiscal year 2010 through 2014 to provide assistance to foreign countries to promote food security, to stimulate rural economies and to improve emergency response to food crises.

The bill states that the objective of U.S. policy is to promote global food security, improve agricultural productivity and support the development of institutions of higher learning. In order to uphold these goals, the Global Food Security Act of 2009 directs the president to assign a Special Coordinator for Food Security to advise the president on global food security issues and to oversee implementation of a comprehensive food security strategy. The president would be required to report on the strategy implementation to specific congressional committees each year.

Other sections of the bill amend the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 expanding the scope of assistance to include conservation farming, nutrition for vulnerable populations and economic integration of persons in extreme poverty. In addition, the bill includes biotechnological advances appropriate to local ecological conditions under agricultural research.

In order to improve emergency response to food crises, the Global Food Security Act of 2009 establishes a United States Emergency Rapid Response to Food Crisis Fund and authorizes the president to provide assistance under this act for unexpected critical food assistance needs.

-- Jaimie Hwang

Keep up the Good Work

In an article for the Washington Times, former senator Dr. Bill Frist praises the efforts of the United States to fight measles, malaria, and AIDS throughout Africa. Although there has been success in these areas, however, Dr. Frist urges readers that there are serious issues which are being overlooked. Easily treatable pneumonia and diarrhea are taking the lives of countless newborns and young children.

"If 12,500 children were to die each day of preventable and readily treatable causes here at home, we would treat it as a national emergency. African children - who perish at that distressing pace - deserve a similarly determined and urgent response from their governments and the international community. Simply put, it is the right thing to do. We cannot continue to allow one of every seven African children to die when it is so readily within our reach to prevent those deaths. "

Dr. Frist urges American as well as African leaders to step up and do more to combat this issue. Specifically, he proposes that leaders at next month's G-8 Summit "declare that no country with a credible and accountable plan for newborn, child and maternal health should be thwarted for lack of donor resources. "

Source: Washington Times

The Initiating Foreign Assistance Reform Act of 2009

On April 29, Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee Representative Howard Berman (D-CA- 28) and Representative Mark Kirk (R-IL-10) introduced H.R. 2139, the “Initiating Foreign Assistance Reform Act of 2009,” to increase political accountability of foreign assistance.

The bill directs President Obama to develop and execute a comprehensive national strategy to advance the U.S. foreign policy goal of furthering global development. It also acts as a precursor to a larger reform effort later this year, including a complete rewrite of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961.

The “Initiating Foreign Assistance Act of 1961” has four key sections. It requires the president to develop and implement a National Strategy for Global Development, which will define the roles of each department and agency involved in U.S. global development policies, programs and activities to make them more efficient. In order to monitor the effectiveness of U.S. foreign assistance, the bill also requires the president to set up a thorough evaluation system and provide transparency of the National strategy for both U.S. taxpayers and recipients of U.S. foreign assistance. Information on the planning, allocating, disbursement, contracting, monitoring and evaluating of foreign assistance will all be made publicly available. In addition, the national strategy will also identify objectives for U.S. development programs aiming to reduce poverty and fostering economic-growth in developing nations. Lastly, the bill repeals and reforms outdated provisions of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961.

-- Jaimie Hwang

Read Complete Bill Information Here.

Pope Tells Leaders to Take Action

Next week, leaders from around the world will be gathering in New York for a two-day U.N. summit to discuss the financial crisis. In his weekly address, Pope Benedict urged the leaders "to transform the crisis into an opportunity for greater attention to the dignity of every human and a fairer distribution of power and resources." It is unacceptable that so many people are starving throughout the world, he said, and it is the responsibility of developed countries to provide the proper assistance for them.

Source: Reuters

Rumors about the Global Food Security Act

Critics of the Global Food Security Act, S.384, have recently begun using the argument that the bill promotes genetically modified (GM) technologies, and that any food aid provided would require any recipient countries to approve GM products. This argument might sound legitimate, but it has no factual basis. Actually, the bill does not require the use of GM technology by any farmers recieving aid. Each individual farmer retains the ability to make his own decisions on his crops. The only mention of GM technology in the entire bill is in section 202, where it suggests the possible benefits of using modified seeds to compete with harsh conditions such as drought or heavy flooding. In most developing countries, planting a successful crop is not just a matter of putting seeds into the ground; many farmers have the difficult task of combatting the unrelenting nature of their particular environment. The Global Food Security Act by no means makes it a requirement to use GM foods, rather it suggests its use for the sake of the farmers. To create a well-informed opinion about the bill, read the full text of it here for yourself, and remember to call your Congressional leaders to voice your support.