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MSU Agricultural Economics | Research > Food Security Group > World Food Summit |
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Download a copy of the paper in pdf (Adobe Acrobat) format.
By Jean-Charles Le Vallée,
Visiting Research Specialist
Department of Agriculture Economics, Michigan State University
levallee@pilot.msu.edu
The arrival of Internet technology has opened up the possibilities of sharing information, ideas, and joining people from all four corners of the world to participate in events and debates which may take place thousands of kilometers away. An excellent tool for the promotion of events such as the U.S.-Canadian Forum for the World Food Summit, setting up a discussion group and website has allowed to those who could not attend, to not only participate in the debate by sending in and sharing their points of view, but also to live the event itself.
The Internet Forum on Food Security is an initiative of the Association d'Économie Alimentaire et Agroindustrielle (AIEA2) and of Laval University. Thanks to an invitation on the part of colleagues at Michigan State University, together, we set up the North American World Food Summit discussion group. The main objectives of the Forum were to help in the preparations of the conference by identifying strategies to meet the challenges of food security, attain the objectives of the North American joint position to be presented at the upcoming World Food Summit and continue the fight against hunger and malnutrition in the world going into and through the 21st century.
The discussion group was set up 10 days before the Michigan conference, and has received during that period, over 80 subscribers, joining the other members of the group at the Internet Forum on Food Security, for a total of over 283 members. A closer look at the new members, indicates that most of the participants come from the US and Canada but many of the new subscribers come such parts of the world as New Zealand, Australia and Hong Kong, from Mexico and Bolivia and to many European countries as well. There are a great variety of fields in which the members work in as well, from universities to governments, international organizations such as the FAO, from NGOs to private industry. Interestingly, marking on the preparation on their regional papers in their home countries such as Brazil, Germany and France to name a few. The group has received many contributions from as far as Australia and Kenya as well as many parts of the USA.
The website became increasingly popular as the date of the conference approached, achieving over a 100 visitors daily. In all, over 1200 visitors are expected to have visited the website. The website has attracted over 22000 visitors in less than 10 months, since its founding. The origin of visitors is somewhat more diversified than with the discussion group as over forty countries of origin were counted. As with the discussion group, about over half come from North America, about a third from Europe and parts of Oceania (Australia and New Zealand), and the rest distributed between Latin America, Africa and Asia. With the help of the discussion group, and the people and website at Michigan State University, our website has also succeeded in disseminating information about the Michigan meeting as well as the World Food Summit. About a quarter of all visitors have downloaded a copy of the joint North American Position, of which a third have downloaded a copy in French.
When the Internet Forum on Food Security was first set up, many themes affecting food security were discussed and presented at the 50th Anniversary Symposium of the FAO in Quebec City (a copy of the model used for debate at the Internet Forum on Food Security can be found in figure 1). Following this event, one wish was to pursue the debate leading up the World Food Summit and beyond. For the occasion of the U.S.-Canadian Forum for the World Food Summit, a discussion group was set up to debate over the joint North American position paper. Overall, there were 8 themes covered by the debate. The first six cover the six commitment areas of the paper. The seventh question concerns the overall strategy and the eighth, objectives that have not been addressed by the joint paper.
In the debate, the commitment areas which the participants took part in debating the most were : "Monitoring and follow-up" followed closely by the commitment area "Improving access to food for food insecure groups, including on an emergency basis" and by the seventh question on the overall strategy of the joint paper. Many responses were also received for "Mobilizing more effective international efforts to supplement and reinforce national commitments" and for the objectives that the joint paper did not assess. All commitment areas received at least one contribution.
Many themes were brought up such as the decline in food aid availability, the use of remote sensing, Africa's policy problems, wether the FAO is the right organization to look objectively at food needs. One particular popular theme was trade as a best solution to better ensuring food security and trade driven agricultural technology systems as the primary vehicles for poverty alleviation and assisting food insecure countries to access the technologies that rural producers and agribusinesses will need to reduce food insecurity based on diversifying their resources into commodities that they can market in the emerging trade-driven global economy.
Some questions discussed wether the funding priorities of CIDA and USAID were really consistent with the joint paper, which identifies key problems as lying in low productivity in the food systems of Africa and South Asia.
One participant wrote on the importance of where to purchase food aid and of poverty : "Pushing the acquisition of food aid from local and regional sources where available to support local agricultural development and markets, in a way contributes to price stability. Countries must try to purchase from the least expensive market. The importance of an international fund is to provide timely resources to get gains from markets to meet emergency needs."
According to the participants, the big problem is poverty and the question is how to most efficiently increase purchasing power among the most disadvantaged. Can a case be made for an international food stamp program? Another participant replied : "The important strategic question is how to increase the effective demand for food among developing countries and the most disadvantaged within these countries? An international food stamp program funded from a consolidated fund at an international level will provide countries with an efficient alternative to the present food-aid program. It has the merit of promoting international markets rather than dampening them. This idea could be further developed at the country level by encouraging NGOs and other aid agencies to adopt a voucher system for agricultural inputs (such as seeds and fertilizers) and food rather than distributing them freely, while simultaneously providing technical assistance to develop those sectors. This will empower the farmers and consumers to PURCHASE the needed inputs and food thus encouraging the production, trade and markets for these products and ultimately increasing the incomes of the people involved in these activities."
Many replied on the importance of local sources of food production and on how improved market information in the developing world would increase the capacity of the rural poor to reallocate their resources to alternative investments that provide greater opportunity to enhance rural poor income-earning and food-purchasing ability. "Where are these alternative investment opportunities to be found? Trade!", a participant wrote. "Trade generates economic efficiencies from comparative advantage and stimulates economic growth, which is critical to improving food security", as can be found in the joint paper.
One thought on the environment was received : "The question is not food or environment but rather food and environment. And this is the role of agricultural education, to impart understanding of both the balance which must be struck between food production and environmental protection, and of the international context of this balance".
Finally, the participants have all agreed that most of the proposed "objectives and actions to be taken" have been addressed but many have felt that paper was without any common strategy to achieve the proposed objectives, and that in order to better achieve food security, other common objectives should be included. For example :
-Give timely information of impending food shortages or surpluses by providing advance information on the anticipated production and requirement of basic food commodities;
-Provide a system for continuous monitoring of the food security situation including crop forecasting, monitoring of price movements, market arrivals, input supplies and food stocks;
-Identify food shortage and/or surplus areas and assess their requirements for additional food supplies and/or possibilities for moving grain from surplus to deficit areas or to export market;
-Identify each population groups access to food and assessing their requirement for additional food supplies;
-Strengthen existing information sources and ensure that all relevant available data on crop outlook or food security situations in governments, agencies, etc., flow to a common unit which will provide periodic analysis and special reports.
This debate summary presents the main themes of the discussions which dominated the discussions over the past ten days preceding the conference. The debate focused on the development of strategies on achieving the objectives and actions to be taken as set out in the North American position paper. Responding to these strategies, further debate may be oriented to discuss very important issues such as the monitoring of food stocks and greater participation of private industry in food stocks; the role of trade, increasing purchasing power, and local sources of food production and regional food aid, etc. Information technology may serve as a tool for more efficient access of producers to market and crop information, as well as the coordination of food supplies. The opportunities and immense possibilities which are offered through information technology must be capitalized upon to develop mechanisms of sharing information, knowledge and know-how.
The North American World Food Summit discussion group and the Internet Forum on Food Security serve as a good example of how information technology may be used to allow people who cannot attend, to participate and exchange in the debate. Allowing the participants to share their different points of view and in local experiences which may help or which were not taken into account in other regions, and to allow the people in the field to receive up to date information on events and results of discussions which may help them in their function. Many have asked to continue the debate once the Michigan meeting will be over and for the upcoming World Food Summit. What are the possibilities of further discussions? The Forum may serve as an example for other events such as the World Food Summit.
Not having exhausted the theme of food security, we think that the Forum consisted of an occasion without precedent to enrich our knowledge on world food security. The richness of the debate cannot be completely appreciated simply by one visit to the website. It would be interesting to continue the debate on the present trends, challenges and strategies to follow, as well as those to come through the 21st century. We invite you to take part in the debate.