Brussels, 06/03/2008 (Agence Europe) - On 6 March, Josette Sheeran, Executive Director of the World Food Programme (WFP) sounded a real warning in Brussels, where she had come to inform the European Parliament development committee of the impact of the surge in food and oil prices on the world's poorest people, who faced the risk of famine.
“The cost of wheat doubled between May and September 2007. This is the largest structural change in the food market since the Second World War. We are in an emergency situation in many countries. World food stocks are at their lowest levels and have only enough to last 53 days,” she said.
The increase in the costs of food and transporting aid caused by record oil prices have severely affected the WFP's ability to respond to hunger in the world. The United Nations agency must find a way to overcome a $500 million deficit if it wants to continue its intervention programme, as approved for 2008 (a deficit of $375 million for food aid, to which must be added $125 for transporting the aid). The operational budget for 2008 is €3.4 billion. But the cost of basic foodstuffs has risen by around 40% since the middle of 2007, when the WFP estimated its costs, Sheeran said. “If nobody helps us, we will have no other choice than to cut food rations or the number of people to whom we can deliver aid,” she stated, calling for a solution to be found to erase this shortfall. To get round transport costs, the WFP buys as much as possible on site, at market prices: “80% of our food is bought locally,” she said, acknowledging the contribution of European aid. Speaking about the food riots in Burkina Faso, Cameroon and Senegal, she added: “If we do not face up to this new challenge, we risk losing all the progress already made”. The African Union's decision to launch a green revolution by investing in agriculture, Sheeran said, was a major step forward because “Africa has the ability to produce double its current production”.
Among the other factors involved in the soaring prices affecting the poorest people, Sheeran mentioned China's and India's economic booms which have resulted in increased demand for food products, the increasing occurrence of severe weather events, like the hurricanes in Australia and Africa, the production of biofuels “which is preventing agricultural land being used to produce food, leading to competition between food supply and fuel supply” and, of course, its corollary, the rise in food prices in line with the cost of fuel. “Palm oil is now being sold at the same price as fuel in Africa. … The market is flooded with foodstuffs that the poor cannot buy”, as is the case in Burkina Faso and Indonesia, she said, describing this development as the “new face of famine”. “Those most affected are the small farmers, the urban poor and those with no incomes.”
Sheeran told Jürgen Schroeder (who had asked her the key to the success of the WFP operations in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and wanted suggestions as to how to improve the situation) that “the real revolution in food aid is in the purchase of local produce to feed the population. WFP personnel are the main ones responsible for this success. But the government worked alongside us. Local purchases have increased 30% recently,” she stated. This was principally due to the re-opening of supply routes by road.
In response to a question from Thijs Berman (PES, Netherlands) on how much speculation was to blame for soaring food prices, Sheeran said that the situation could be explained by several “structural reasons” and that the proper questions had to be asked: “Are our emergency response mechanisms the right ones?” An answer to these questions would avoid the WFP's having to “launch aid appeals” every year. Josep Borell (PES, Spain), chairman of the development committee, assured Sheeran that her last call had been heard: the Parliament, in its role as budgetary authority, would certainly do what was necessary to respond to it. On 25 February, External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner told the Parliament's budget committee that she backed an increase in funding for food aid. The €160 million recently released by the Commission to combat hunger in the world (see EUROPE 9616) will go mainly to the WFP, but the decision was taken before this call was launched. (A.N.)