Chief General Of The Un Food And Agriculture Organization

Former Director-General of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), Jacques Diouf, once commented, Defeating hunger is a realistic goal for our time, as long as lasting political, economic, financial, and technical solutions are adopted. In his speech, Diouf referred to a sustainable development issue known as food security, an international issue that involves the availability, access, utilization, and stability of food. With recent global attention directed towards seemingly more pressing issues such as non-state terrorism and gender equality, issues such as food insecurity have largely become neglected - tabled, especially by the media. However, it is very much a current and urgent issue with recent events such as the FAO†¦show more content†¦When individuals experience a sustained dearth of sufficient, safe, and nutritious food, food insecurity exists, and today, this issue is most prevalent in Sub-Saharan Africa. While food insecurity has always existed, the more recent food crisis that occurred in 2007 and 2008 has expanded the problem to affect more and more people on the global stage. One reason food insecurity exists is because of the lack of production. In six of the last eleven years, the rate of global consumption was higher than that of production. The rising demand of food compounded with high energy prices and climate change makes food more difficult and more expensive to produce. As a result, nations must address problems that deal with food waste. Further, food insecurity not only involves hunger, malnutrition, and famine but is also a catalyst for riots within nations and tensions between nations. For example, in just the first half of 2008, riots broke out in over 40 different nations. Food insecurity also negatively affects a country s economic development, environment, and trade. Furthermore, it is an issue that affects not only the hungry 1/8 of the world s population but also small-scale farmers trapped in farm debt around the world. These farmers need access to technology and information, local storage systems, and crop insurance in order to es tablish efficient food production. In sum,