The three-day World Summit on Food Security (WSFS) that opened in Rome, Italy on 16 November, 2009 has ended with serious differences among participants. Among those expressing dissatisfaction with the final declaration was no less a person than Jacques Diouf, the head of UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO). Diouf criticised the declaration for not including exact targets to reduce hunger. There is no mention of a deadline for the...

The plight of the hungry in developing countries is needlessly aggravated by farmers losing up to half of their crops after gathering the harvest, the United Nations agricultural agency said today, stressing that adequate investment and training could drastically cut the losses. The Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) said that excessive rainfall, droughts, extreme temperatures, contamination by micro-organisms, and premature harvesting are among the causes of these post-harvest losses, which...

When the Indian government met the largest economic crisis the world has faced in nearly 80 years with tax cuts, aid for rural workers and interest rate cuts, critics said it was not enough. Now, though, it looks as if the policy makers may have offered too much. India’s $1 trillion economy, largely insulated from the global crisis by low reliance on exports and a heavily regulated banking system, has exceeded expectations...

Some 800 million people in the world were malnourished even before the food and economic crises hit.  Now a push to confront this longer-term problem is picking up steam. Leaders at recent global gatherings agreed to back a multibillion dollar initiative to boost agriculture and food security in low-income countries. Discussions on the overall design and level of funding are continuing. In September, the G20 asked the World Bank to...

A new international report slams the Indian government for not doing enough to end hunger. It says hunger exists in India because of a lack of purchasing capacity of the poor rather due to insufficiency of food production. Titled “Who’s Really Fighting Hunger”?, (see the link below) the Action Aid report which was released on 16 October, 2009 reveals that in India 30 million people have been added to the...