World powers urged to act quickly to control food prices

World powers must act quickly and boldly to control soaring food prices that threaten nearly 1 billion people with hunger and could trigger devastating social unrest across the globe, the United Nations said today.

At a three-day emergency food summit, U.N. officials urged nations to eliminate trade barriers, expand research into biotechnology and boost production with an annual investment of $20 billion to $30 billion.

“Nothing is more degrading than hunger, especially when man-made,” U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told more than 40 world leaders gathered here for the meeting. Hungry people, he warned, are angry people.

Hunger breeds “social disintegration, ill health and economic decline,” he said.

Ban and other senior U.N. officials painted a dire picture of political turmoil fueled by starvation and scarcities and of rich countries that have failed to keep past promises to confront the global food crisis.

Jacques Diouf, secretary-general of the U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization, scolded the world’s wealthy for wasteful consumption and for excessive spending on weapons while ignoring the hungry.

“How can we explain to people of good sense and good faith that it was not possible to find $30 billion a year” to feed the world’s hungry, respecting “the most fundamental of human rights: the right to food and the right to life,” he said.

Ban said food production would have to grow 50% by 2030 to stave off starvation. The global price tag could be at least $20 billion annually. Countries such as India and China that impose export bans because they are worried about feeding their own people only worsen the problem by forcing prices yet higher, he said.

Meteoric food prices, historically high fuel costs, the growing demand for biofuels, a string of poor harvests exacerbated by climate change, speculation – all of these factors have combined to make food unavailable or unaffordable to hundreds of millions of people, including an emerging category of what officials call the “new hungry.” Experts say prices of many commodities, such as rice and wheat, have doubled in the last three years, pushing staples out of the reach of many people.

The summit is also highlighting serious disagreements over the causes of the food crisis. The use of biofuels, for example, diverting grain to produce fuel instead of food, quickly emerged as one of the most divisive topics. The United States allocates large percentages of its corn crop to the production of ethanol, which critics blame for part of the overall scarcity.

“Use crops as food for people, not fuel for engines,” Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak told the summit.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva took the opposite stand. His nation has a booming industry of ethanol production based on sugar cane and argues that biofuels are a more environmentally friendly energy source.

“It offends me to see fingers pointed against clean energy from biofuels, fingers soiled with oil and coal,” he said. “Biofuels are not the villain menacing food security in poor countries.”

 wilkinson@latimes.com