Today's Agriculture and Food Security News

Today's top stories on global agricultural development and food security issues.

January 27, 2012
By Sung Lee

Today, the World Economic Forum launched a new report, “Putting the New Vision for Agriculture into Action”, outlining the key steps required to achieve an ambitious, lasting transformation in agriculture. The report sets goals of 20 percent improvement per decade on each of its three goals: economic growth and opportunity, food security and nutrition, and environmental sustainability. The report puts forward specific recommendations to achieve this goal. The report’s summary is available here.

Could High Food Prices Be a Blessing in Disguise?, Wall Street Journal, January 27
High food prices may sound catastrophic, but they may actually turn out to be a blessing in disguise for African farmers, says the head of the United Nations’ World Food Programme. “You can look at hunger as a Malthusian nightmare, or you can look it as a tremendous opportunity because everyone has to eat,” says Josette Sheeran, executive director of the WFP, referring to a theory that once population growth exceeds agricultural production, people will be forced to return to subsistence-level conditions.

Global hunger: do the figures add up?, Guardian, January 26
Unfortunately, little of the uncertainty surrounding global hunger estimates is ever reported alongside the emotive, top-line figures. Debating the merits of different statistical models could seem trivial, even distasteful, in the face of the scandalous situation whereby large numbers of people worldwide are going hungry. Global hunger figures are not just soundbites, however. They are also used to help guide where to send foreign aid, track progress towards international development goals, and hold governments to account for promises made.

Feeding the 9bn, Editorial, Financial Times, January 25
Small farmers who produce the lion’s share of agricultural commodities in the poorest countries also need better access to mobile networks that will bring them more reliable weather reports, advice on resource management, commodities pricing and money transfer arrangements. Countries with closed economies must recognise that the best way to rectify such weaknesses is to foster private investment. This may mean opening up to foreign as well as domestic investment.

Bill Gates pushes ‘green revolution’ for small farms in developing world, Washington Post, January 25
In a new push for the Gates Foundation, the Microsoft chairman is focusing on basic research on crops such as cassava that hold little interest for the world’s agriculture multinationals but which are important for family farmers in some developing nations. “The speed and productivity increases should rival that period,” he said in a recent interview, referring to the decades since the 1960s when the development of high-yielding hybrid crops, better pest and land management, and other advances led to plentiful supplies and falling prices of food staples.

Food prices to go up by at least 2-3%, warns Unilever global head Paul Polman, The Economic Times, January 26
Polman, one of the five co-chairs at WEF in Davos and head of the G20 business task force on food security and agriculture, said he expected this to be the case for the foreseeable future. According to him, commodity prices can only keep heading steadily upwards, and pressure of global commodity pricing will increase. Food companies such as Unilever too needed to approach the issue of sustainable agriculture holistically. "After all, we have to have a sustainable source for our products," he said.

 

Comments

[farmland investments]

Interesting approach to the idea by the WSJ. I suppose its easy for them to say that high food prices are a blessing because it forces people to go back to subsistence agriculture, but what about for the Africans involved. Please check out this report from McKinsey here on African ag - http://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/Four_lessons_for_transforming_African_agriculture_2785. You have to register on the McKinsey site, but it just takes a second and is well worth reading.