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G8: Global Food Security Plan Expected

Ramesh Jaura

TOYAKO, Japan, Jul 6 2008 (IPS) - A landmark agreement on ensuring global food security is likely to emerge from the G8 summit in Toyako.

The agreement would reflect an intertwining between soaring food prices, climate change, and surging energy costs, conference sources say.

These themes are high on the agenda of the Jul. 7-9 meetings of the G8 group of countries (Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Russia, Canada, Japan and the United States).

The agreement may lead to the creation of a new institution modelled on the International Energy Agency (IEA) that was founded during the oil crisis of 1973-74. Its initial role was to coordinate measures in an oil supply emergency.

The new institution could be linked to the World Bank, the sources said, or become a part of the New Deal on Global Food Policy that World Bank president Robert Zoellick had proposed in April.

Both Zoellick and IEA executive director Nobuo Tanaka will be attending the G8 discussions on the food crisis, climate change and surging energy costs.


“We are entering a danger zone,” Zoellick had said in a letter to Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda Jul. 1. The crisis has worsened even since April, he said.

For the first time since 1973, the world is being hit by a combination of record oil and food prices, threatening to drive more than 100 million people into extreme poverty and reverse the gains made in overcoming poverty over the last seven years, Zoellick said.

Some 41 countries have lost 3 to 10 percent of their gross domestic product (GDP) from rising food, fuel and commodity prices. At least 30 countries have been hit by food riots, the World Bank chief pointed out in the letter.

A report last month said the prices of basic food commodities have increased rapidly over the past three years. In only the first quarter of 2008, wheat and maize prices increased by 130 percent and 30 percent respectively over 2007 figures. Rice prices, after rising moderately in 2006 and more in 2007, rose 10 percent in February 2008 and a further 10 percent in March 2008.

“The threat to food security in developing countries increases in stride. Coordinated action by the international community, and by the United Nations in particular, is essential,” the United Nations’ specialised agency, the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) said in its report.

“Responding effectively to the impact of higher food prices must be top priority for the global community, particularly when the impact is combined with the projected effects of climate change”, IFAD president Lennart Båge said.

IFAD’s immediate response has been to make available up to 200 million dollars to provide an urgent boost to agricultural production in the developing world, in the face of high food prices and low food stocks.

But IFAD will also continue to press for rapid and urgent longer-term investment in agriculture, including access to land, water, technology, financial services and markets, Båge said.

The objective is to enable the 450 million smallholder farms in developing countries grow more food, more productively, and thereby increase their incomes and resilience.

The compelling need to find new ways to resolve the critical food situation has also been emphasised by Jacques Diouf, director-general of the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO).

The number of hungry people increased by about 50 million in 2007 as a result of high food prices, Diouf told a conference at the European Parliament in Brussels Jul. 3.

“Poor countries are feeling the serious impact of soaring food and energy prices,” Diouf said. “We urgently need new and stronger partnerships to address the growing food security problems in poor countries. No single institution or country will be able to resolve this crisis. Donor countries, international institutions, governments of developing countries, civil society and the private sector have an important role to play in the global fight against hunger.”

Conference sources expect World Bank president Zoellick to push the G8 to a New Deal on Global Food Policy that would integrate and mobilise a diverse range of partners.

These include the Gates Foundation, the FAO, the World Food Programme, IFAD, multilateral development banks, agricultural research institutions, developing countries with great agricultural experience, such as Brazil; and the private sector.

The new deal plans to respond to the food crisis through social safety nets, increased agricultural production, and reduced trade barriers. It was endorsed by the World Bank’s steering committee of finance and development ministers at a meeting in Washington in April.

The possibility of a substantial plan emerging from the G8 summit was also indicated by the Japanese daily newspaper Asahi Shimbun. The newspaper reported on Saturday (Jul. 5) that the basic idea is to stockpile grains to better cope with future food crises. Some grains, such as wheat, which cannot be stored for a long time, will be replenished to maintain the allocated stockpile amounts, according to the reported plan.

Under the proposed system, each member state of the G8 will be required to store specific amounts of grains and release them into the market in a coordinated effort to stabilise grain prices when necessary. Presently, Japan and Germany are the only G8 countries that have surplus grains in stock.

The creation of the food stockpile system was agreed at a meeting of top officials of G8 nations preparing for the summit meetings, the newspaper said.

According to the agreement, the G8 nations will set up a council of experts to discuss details of the plan, including quotas for each participating country, an inventory management system, and the channels through which the grains will be released into the market.

But uncertainty remains over how effective the system will be in stabilising food prices. Many other factors have led to soaring prices and food shortages that have sparked unrest in some countries.

Export restrictions, for example, are one of the factors contributing to surging food prices.

The special document to emerge from the Toyako summit will say that such export controls should be based on strict disciplinary rules, the newspaper said.

The document will also express concerns about the ongoing excessive inflow of speculative funds into food markets, which has also pushed up prices. It will say that the markets should be open and efficient, the Asahi Shimbun reported, quoting unnamed sources.

Referring to the growing use of grain-derived biofuels to power vehicles, the document will call for a balanced approach between production and use of grains in line with food security.

The Japanese government has planned its own counter measures – totalling 1.1 billion dollars – to deal with food problems, including 50 million dollars in emergency aid besides 200 million dollars that has already been pledged.

The 50 million dollars will be provided to struggling nations by October through the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) and bilateral channels.

Japan will also extend 480 million dollars in yen loans for counter measures and 230 million dollars in grant assistance and technical support.

Reports from Germany quoted German Chancellor Angela Merkel as saying the G8 will take measures to fight the soaring price of food. Merkel hosted last year’s G8 summit.

“A vast catalogue of measures to guarantee food supplies worldwide” is expected to be adopted at the G8 summit, Merkel told the German newspaper Der Tagesspiegel am Sonntag that was on the newsstands on Sunday.

The measures are intended “to provide short term relief to the food crisis and a long-term strategy to increase the world agricultural production,” Merkel said.

 
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