By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, 4 May 2023 (IDN) — A new report on world hunger by the Global Network Against Food Crises (GNAFC) is a setback to the UN’s highly-publicized goal of eradicating extreme poverty and hunger by 2030—an integral part of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
Far from achieving progress in the fight against hunger, the latest numbers indicate a reversal in the battle front.
By Jaya Ramachandran
PARIS, 19 April 2023 (IDN) — The Sahel and West Africa region is facing a chronic food and nutrition crisis, with 29.5 million people currently needing immediate food and nutrition assistance. This number could reach 42.5 million people by June-August 2023 if appropriate measures are not taken.
By Pattama Vilailert
KAEN MAKROOD, Thailand (IDN) — With the belief that without seeds, there is no hope of sustaining food security to accommodate the global population, the 'Seeds of Hope' (SOH) project in Thailand aims to mobilize the community to be self-reliant in their farming methods and protect themselves from predatory agri-business companies. (P30) CHINESE | JAPANESE TEXT VERSION PDF | THAI | TURKISH
Catastrophic Consequences Feared
By J Nastranis
NEW YORK (IDN) — The United Nations has warned that the Horn of Africa is facing an unprecedented drought emergency, which will unleash catastrophic consequences. Communities in the region are in the midst of a likely fifth consecutive failed rainy season. They may face a sixth failed season in March-May 2023. (P28) ARABIC | GERMAN | JAPANESE TEXT VERSION PDF
By Jeffrey Moyo
HARARE, Zimbabwe (IDN) — At unoccupied swathes of land behind houses in Bloomingdale, a medium-income suburb in the Zimbabwean capital Harare, numerous maize fields and vegetable gardens have emerged as urban dwellers enduring economic hardships switch to backyard farming.
Zambia, despite emerging from an economic crisis during former President Edgar Lungu’s reign that ended last year, has dozens of urban dwellers taking up agriculture to supplement their earnings. (P26) JAPANESE TEXT VERSION PDF | SWAHILI
Viewpoint by Abebe Haile-Gabriel
The writer is the Assistant Director-General and Regional Representative for Africa of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). It was published in Horn Observer on October 13, ahead of World Food Day on October 16.
ACCRA (IDN) — More than a billion Africans cannot afford a healthy diet. Africa is moving backwards in its efforts to end hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition. This situation is not sustainable.
By Farai Shawn Matiashe
MUTARE, Zimbabwe (IDN) — Ruth Rugeje, 38, monitors plants of cabbages, a pale green leafy vegetable, grown in empty two-litre bottles in the backyard of her home in Mutapa, a high-density suburb in the central Zimbabwean city of Gweru.
This innovative farmer picked these plastic bottles from the illegal dumping sites in her neighbourhood and reused them in hydroponics. (P18) CHINESE | JAPANESE TEXT VERSION PDF | SWAHILI
By Kalinga Seneviratne
SUVA, Fiji (IDN) — Though sugar cane is thought to be indigenous to the islands of the South Pacific, it was the British who started to grow it as a cash crop in Fiji in the later part of the 19th century. In 37 years, beginning in 1879, they shipped some 60,000 Indians over 7000 miles from home to work as indentured labourers in the newly established plantation for very little or no salary on 5-year contracts. (P11) GERMAN | HINDI | JAPANESE TEXT VERSION PDF
By Jutta Wolf
BERLIN (IDN) — "Faced with the worst hunger crisis in a generation, the G7 have simply failed to take the action needed. Many millions will face terrible hunger and starvation as a result," declared Max Lawson, head of inequality policy at Oxfam International. "Instead of doing what is needed, the G7 are leaving millions to starve and cooking the planet," he added.
Viewpoint by Jonathan Power
LUND, Sweden (IDN) — The world is lather about the jump in world food prices in world food prices. Just this last weekend the Minister of Agriculture of Egypt was saying that, without assured grain supplies from Russia and Ukraine, he expected a rise of widespread malnutrition.
As long ago as 1974, when grain prices had just quadrupled, all the nations of the world meeting at the World Food Conference in Rome promised that by the end of the century “no child would go to bed hungry”. After a steady increase in aid for agriculture for a number of years the momentum slowed.
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- A New Integrated Financing Facility to Help Achieve UN’s Development Goals by 2030
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- UN’s Goal of Poverty & Hunger Eradication by 2030 is “Highly Unlikely, if not Impossible”
- Sri Lanka: Government’s Badly Planned Organic Farming Policy Upsets Rice Farmers
