“In the longer-term it is clear that our communal solution lies in increased – more diverse, and more resilient – agricultural production, above all in developing countries,” said Kamalesh Sharma at a UN FAO conference in Rome, Italy Click here to listen to speech
Secretary-General addresses special Food Security summit in Rome
4 June 2008
Commonwealth’s best efforts will be channelled into improving farming production, says Sharma
The Commonwealth’s most effective contribution to the current global food crisis lies in wide-ranging support for farmers to enhance productivity, Commonwealth Secretary-General Kamalesh Sharma has said.
In the first speech a Secretary-General of the Commonwealth has ever given to a UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) conference, Mr Sharma said: “Our best Commonwealth efforts – our technical assistance programmes, our convening power for the exchange of best practice, and our capacity to lobby other international actors – will be channelled into this simple aim, to improve production.”
Food security
The Commonwealth stresses that food security is an issue of human rights, as much as a question of economics – Secretary-General.
The Secretary-General, speaking alongside more than 40 Heads of Government in Rome, Italy, explained that the Commonwealth’s immediate response to this crisis will be to rally support from member countries around new funding mechanisms set up to meet the next planting season.
He said that the Commonwealth will also continue to lobby in the Doha Development Round for an end to agricultural subsidies in the developed world, as well as a review of export restrictions in grain-exporting countries.
“Further, we will lend our voice to the call for an international examination into the level of subsidies underlying much current bio-fuel production,” Mr Sharma added.
The Doha Development Round’s objective is to lower trade barriers around the world, permitting free trade between countries of varying prosperity.
At an intermediate level, he noted that the Commonwealth will continue to inform the global debate and carry on with a series of regional studies on the effects of climate change on the agricultural sector.
“In the longer term,” Mr Sharma said, “it is clear that our communal solution lies in increased – more diverse, and more resilient – agricultural production, above all in developing countries.”
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