There has been no progress towards meeting targets to halve the number of hungry people in the world, according to a UN report to be published today. Some 826 million people do not have enough to eat. The figure remains largely unchanged since the last update in the mid-1990s.
Governments pledged at a world summit in 1996 to reduce the number of hungry to 400 million by 2015. But today's report says it will take 30 years to achieve this as the rate of progress is so slow. "Hungry people cannot wait another 15 years," it warns.
While some progress has been made in Asia, none has been made in Africa. Most of those suffering from hunger are women and children.
The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation's report The State of Food Insecurity in the World is being issued in Dublin and other cities to coincide with World Food Day, an annual event designed to raise awareness about hunger. But many believe enough awareness-raising has been done, enough declarations signed and that the time has come for governments to pay out.
"The developed world has to wake up to the fact that these targets are for real. That means not falling back on overseas development assistance and that has been happening. It really is very disappointing when the world was never as rich as we are now," according to the Minister with special responsibility for Overseas Development Assistance and Human Rights, Ms Liz O'Donnell.
If every developed nation were donating the UN target of 0.7 per cent of their growth, or GDP, the world would be well within its target levels for reducing hunger, Ms O'Donnell said. Only four countries have managed this so far - Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Holland - and the Minister expects the Republic to achieve the target by 2007, by contributing £800 million in overseas development assistance.
She said the problem of keeping up with targets for countries with runaway growth rates such as the Republic and the US is no excuse. "You can't change the rules just because your economy grows fast . . . Those targets won't be reached by chance, they won't be reached by rhetoric, they will only be reached if every developed country lives up to the UN target of 0.7 per cent." Mr Stephen Jackson of the International Famine Centre in UCC, which is also releasing a report today on tackling hunger, said there needed to be a new emphasis on the issue. "The UN targets won't be achieved unless there is a switch from a charitable mode of action to a human rights-based response."
Under such an emphasis, he said, governments and institutions would be made accountable if obligations were not met. This meant illegal exporters of "conflict diamonds" would be held accountable for creating conflict and hunger in countries such as Sierra Leone, Angola and Congo. Governments would be sanctioned if aid were not released to their populations or if aid stockpiles were allowed to diminish.
People should not hope for a technological breakthrough or a wonder crop to solve world hunger, as the problem required a political, social and environmental response, he added.
Ms Maura Leen of Trocaire said World Food Day should focus on food security, and the UN should put pressure on the EU to adopt a food security clause. "The EU has supported aid programmes for developing countries and then dumped subsidised beef on their markets," she added.
Debt-relief for developing nations was another area governments needed to focus on if hunger in the world were to be eliminated. "These heavily indebted countries are in grinding poverty and they are spending 30 and 40 per cent of the GNP on debt repayments. It's unconscionable," Ms O'Donnell noted.
Mr Jackson warned that debt relief must be linked to poverty alleviation by governments in developing countries, as without this only the elite would benefit.