InternatIonal responses to the Food CrIsIs

For the first time in human history, the number of hungry people worldwide exceeds 1 billion. According to the most recent estimations by the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), 1.02 billion people in the world are hungry (2009b). Every one in six people is chronically undernourished. In the last couple of years, this number has increased dramatically and the world is further than ever from fulfilling the 1st Millennium's Development Goal - to halve the proportion of the hungry by 2015. In fact, the internationally recognised right to food is million fold violated. The international community, international institutions and domestic governments must intervene to counter the crisis and take long-term measures in order to sustainably ensure food security. It has finally been put high on the international agenda and brought to public attention in 2008. A range of international conferences have been held and much has been talked about the way to eradicate hunger and feed the world. The United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon himself set up the High-Level Task Force (HLTF) to find a common strategy to fight the food crisis. National governments have taken action, from bolstering export restrictions over input subsidies to expanded safety nets. Nevertheless, the number of hungry people is still growing. Governments and Intergovernmental Organisations (IGO) have an obligation to fulfil the right to food of those 1.02 billion people who are suffering from hunger. Collective action under the umbrella of the United Nations (UN), the only democratic organisation under which all 192 developing and developed member states are equally represented, is required - in close coordination with Civil Society and NGOs. This document will give an overview of the initiatives and programmes that have been announced, implemented and realised by the various UN and Bretton-Woods Institutions since 2007 up to now. It will first introduce the relevant actors, the programmes they set up to counter the crisis, their extent and their priorities. Subsequently, these programmes will be analysed along four foci, loosely following the structure of the Comprehensive Framework for Action (CFA) of the HLTF, which will be presented in the second chapter. Finally, these responses will be assessed from a human rights perspective, shortcomings will be pointed out and recommendations will be given. Finally, these responses will be assessed from a human rights perspective, shortcomings will be pointed out and recommendations will be given. As these programmes have only been implemented over the past two years and are still underway, concrete results are not yet available; therefore, a final evaluation of the programmes would be impossible at this point in time. Nevertheless, the design, targets and budgets of the programmes allow for some preliminary conclusions to be drawn and recommendations to be formulated that will hopefully enrich the discussions on and inspire revisions of the current food policies.download