FAO Director-General Jacques Diouf yesterday called on the
international
community not only to take immediate action to de-fuse the current world
food emergency but also to seize the opportunities offered by higher food
prices and prevent similar dramatic situations occurring in the future.
In a statement published on the FAO website, Dr Diouf said, ?The time
for re-launching agriculture is now and the international community should
not miss the opportunity.?

High food commodity prices called for a twin-track approach featuring
policies and programmes to assist the millions of poor whose livelihoods
were at risk, and steps to help farmers in the developing world take
advantage of the new situation.

?We must produce more food where it is urgently needed to contain the
impact of soaring prices on poor consumers, and simultaneously boost
productivity and expand production to create more income and employment
opportunities for the rural poor,? Dr Diouf said.

?We have to ensure that small holder farmers have proper access to
land and water resources and essential inputs such as seeds and fertilisers.
This will enable them to increase their supply response to higher prices,
boosting their incomes, improving their livelihoods, and ultimately
benefiting consumers as well,? Dr Diouf said.

June summit
The issue of food prices will be discussed on June 3-5 when world
leaders meet in Rome at FAO?s invitation to attend a High Level Conference
on World Food Security: the Challenges of Climate Change and Bioenergy.
Guests whose presence at the summit has already been confirmed include
Presidents Sarkozy of France and Lula of Brazil, and UN Secretary-General
Ban Ki-moon.

While high food prices exacerbate food insecurity and create social
tensions there was a danger of the emergency overshadowing the longer-term
aspects, Dr Diouf warned.

?To ensure that small farmers and rural households benefit from higher
food prices, we need to create a favourable policy environment that relaxes
the constraints facing the private sector, farmers and traders,? he added.

That would mean reversing the decline in the level of public resources
spent on agriculture and rural development and investing more in
agriculture, Dr Diouf said. Investments by the private sector in agriculture
and related sectors would be forthcoming if appropriate investments in
public goods were put in place

Constraints not just low prices
Besides historically low prices, farmers in the developing world have
had to battle constraints including lack of infrastructure such as transport
and communications, access to technology and extension services and
well-functioning marketing and credit systems.

Lack of irrigation, especially in sub-Saharan Africa, was another
major problem that must be resolved. When food prices soared in the 1970s
many Asian governments chose to invest in irrigation and agricultural
research, and this set the stage for rapid productivity growth that saved
millions from poverty and hunger, Dr Diouf recalled.

?A similar response is urgently needed today ? particularly in
sub-Saharan Africa,? he added.

Last December FAO launched an emergency Initiative on Soaring Food
Prices (ISFP) to provide 37 Low-Income Food Deficit countries (LIFDCs) with
the seeds and inputs to boost their domestic food production. FAO has called
for 1.7 billion dollars of international financing to implement the plan.
[www.fao.org]