CYPRUS - CHYPRE - CHIPRE

His Excellency Glafcos Clerides, President of the Republic of Cyprus

It is a great honour for me and my country to address this historic summit under the banner of "Food for All".

Very rightly, the scope of this Summit is to renew and mobilize the commitment of the world leaders at the highest level for the eradication of hunger and malnutrition and the achievement of lasting food security for all. Indeed, over the past 50 years, several international fora have repeatedly dealt with and emphasized the importance of eliminating hunger and malnutrition, stressing also the urgent need for improving food security for all people.

The right to food was originally recognized in 1948 through the United Nations and then further defined and formalized as a basic human right by the "International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights" adopted at the United Nations General Assembly in 1966. Furthermore, "The Universal Declaration on the Eradication of Hunger and Malnutrition", adopted in 1974 by the World Food Conference, states that "every man, woman and child has the inalienable right to be free from hunger and malnutrition". Additionally, as many as ten international Conferences, which took place during the last six years, have, directly or indirectly, addressed specific aspects related to food security.

Evidently, during the past five decades considerable knowledge has been gained concerning the causes of hunger and malnutrition, the dimensions of the nutrition problem now, and in the future, and the appropriate actions needed for resolving human society's most basic problem - food insecurity. However, the big challenge still facing us is to transform the universal concern for improving nutritional wellbeing into action. For this reason, while acknowledging the complexity of nutritional problems, there is need for a renewed commitment to undertake concrete actions, on the scale and extent required, through effective policies and strategies dealing with the root causes of hunger and malnutrition.

Regarding the causes of the nutrition problem and the food shortages in many parts of the world, a wide range of information has been made available in the last 25 years, especially after the World Food Conference in 1974. The prevailing view, based on this information, is that poverty coinciding with low development are among the fundamental causes of hunger and malnutrition. This view could be well justified by figures in the recent World Bank publication entitled World Development Report 1996. The data provided in this report indicated that 51 countries classified in the category of low-income economies, with a total population of 3.2 billion, corresponding to 56 percent of the world population, had in 1994 a GNP per capita ranging from US$ 80 to US$ 720, or an average of US$ 380 per capita per annum. A negative growth rate is recorded during 1985-94 for the 24 countries in this category. The amount of external debts for these "low-income economies" was raised from US$ 112 billion in 1980 to US$ 490 billion in 1994. According to the same report, which was recently published by the United Nations, in 89 countries the per capita GNP was lower than that of ten years ago.

Other basic causes of malnutrition, such as armed conflicts, social discrimination, population growth, natural calamities and inadequate economic strategies, are factors directly affecting the success or failure of any policy and programme intervention and should be properly addressed. Armed conflicts, in particular, deserve special attention and consideration by the international community. It is at least disappointing to observe that the great expectations for peace and prosperity, created by the termination of "Cold War" conditions in the early 1990s, have so far not reached any encouraging results. On the contrary, in the mid-1990s there were at least 50 serious armed conflicts on-going in the world, with an increasing concentration of frequency and destructiveness in poorer developing countries. As a consequence of these conflicts, vast numbers of inhabitants had to migrate to more peaceful areas in their own country or into neighbouring countries. At present, the total number of refugees and displaced persons is estimated by the United Nations agencies to be 50 million, while another 35 million are wandering outside their own countries in search of employment.

Besides the tragic effects of these events in terms of millions of victims and human suffering, the consequences to the food situation are inevitably critical, if not desperate. On the other hand, though it is rather impossible to measure the resources destroyed, an indication of the effects of these war activities could be the fact that the United Nations allocated more than US$ 5 billion to peace-keeping operations between 1991-95 for conflicts in Africa alone.

To a great extent the tragic calamities and destructive activities caused by armed conflict are taking place in the less developed countries, where an estimated 840 million people face chronic under-nutrition. Globally as many as 2 billion people, including 200 million children, lack essential micronutrients. With almost 100 million new persons likely to be added to the world's population each year during the coming three decades, there is an urgent need to ensure that today's hunger is addressed today, not tomorrow when its severity and impact may be compounded. The right to food was recognized 50 years ago. However, the acknowledgement of the right to food entails obligations on those who have the means to ensure that those who do not have the means can nevertheless satisfy their basic food needs. This means that, to improve the conditions for a more peaceful and food-secure world, moral and ethical values should be placed at the top of the social, economic and political priority lists. In the final analysis, this approach will be to the benefit of all.

What could one therefore expect to be the result of this Summit? It is well known that, following the decision of the 28th Session of the FAO Conference last November, which Cyprus had the privilege to chair through its Minister of Agriculture, Natural Resources and Environment, a series of meetings have taken place to prepare this Summit. The Secretariat worked very hard to prepare a Declaration and a Plan of Action. Both these documents have received appropriate attention from the Committee on World Food Security and also from the Regional Conferences of FAO. Following all these consultations, all views on this matter have been expressed.

In the light of these thoughts, I wish to register, here and now, my full support for the Rome Declaration and the World Food Summit Plan of Action. What remains to be done is to find the ways to implement this Plan of Action. All necessary means must be placed at the disposal of our Organization to enable it to proceed to its implementation with the ultimate objective of eliminating hunger and malnutrition from our world.