GLOBAL: Improved farming rather than more food aid?
JOHANNESBURG, 9 July 2009 (IRIN): President Barack Obama wants the United States, the worlds largest provider of food aid, to focus on agricultural development in the countries it helps support, rather than having them remain recipients.
“Quite simply, this change in mindset is that food security is part of national security,” said a factsheet issued by the US Department of Agriculture (USDA); this new approach had already begun to unfold in strife-torn, food-deficit Afghanistan and Pakistan.
– This welcome and substantial shift of resources into long-term food security programming marks an important break from past policy, said Chris Barrett, an expert on food aid who teaches development economics at Cornell University.
This “very important strategic shift” towards supporting agriculture “merits widespread applause”, noted he.
The move comes hot on the heels of the 2008 food price crisis, which prompted the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) to call for better governance of food security.
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