Honorable Members of Parliament,

Excellencies, colleagues, ladies and gentlemen,

It gives me immense pleasure, as the Chairperson of the UN Committee on Word Food Security (CFS),  to speak with you today at the Preparatory events towards the Second Global Parliamentary Summit against Hunger and Malnutrition.

I am grateful to Jean-Leonard Touadi, Marcela Villareal and the entire FAO Parliamentarian Team for inviting me join you here today.

Parliaments, and you Members of Parliament,  are at the essential link between words and impact, between deliberations and action, between promises and results. You have the power of translating the global agreements –such as the ones the CFS endorses- into national legislation. Into budgets and into control over the implementation of budgets.

We are living in extremely difficult  times. Hunger and malnutrition in all its forms are major challenges that all countries face. One in three people globally suffers from at least one form of malnutrition.

The figures recently published in the 2022 “State of the World Food Security and Nutrition” report show that hunger is still on the rise as well as micronutrient deficiencies, overweight and obesity. In addition, healthy diets are not affordable for more than 3 billion people.

At the same time, food and agriculture account for around one third of GHG emissions and are the main drivers of biodiversity loss and soil degradation.

We are at a key inflection point. Development gains made over the last decades are under threat. Reaching the 2030 Agenda seems more difficult than ever.

The interlinked shocks of the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change and of conflicts including the war in Ukraine, are worsening an already dire situation.

As our people everywhere continue to face a worsening hunger and malnutrition situation, we look to you for bold leadership and coordinated action.

It is time to work together - URGENTLY - to transform our food systems to deliver food security, adequate nutrition and healthy diets for all people, while providing decent jobs and incomes to family farmers and food producers. These diets must be carbon neutral, reverse biodiversity loss, and restore ecosystems.

In a nutshell, food systems that ensure the achievement of SDG 2 while contributing substantively to all other SDGs and the Rio Climate Conventions.

In order to address these challenges, it is crucial for countries – for you honourable parliamentarians, to develop policy and institutional reforms that take into account all relevant actors and sectors in your countries – especially those communitiesd that are the most dispossessed and the most vulnerable.

The UN Committee on World Food Security (CFS) stands ready to support you.

CFS serves as the global food governance body of the United Nations where 135 Members States of the UN - including most of your countries - are joined by civil society, private sector, research and academia, UN agencies and programmes, international financial institutions, foundations and others, to deliberate upon and drive convergence on global policies to address systemic and structural causes of hunger and malnutrition in support of the efforts led by countries. 

Among our many negotiated policy agreements, today I will focus on the Voluntary Guidelines on Food Systems and Nutrition, endorsed by the Committee in 2021.

These Guidelines were developed through an inclusive multi-stakeholder process that was informed by the scientific evidence of a 2017 report by the CFS High-Level Panel of Experts on Food Security and Nutrition – the HLPE-FSN – which is the scientific arm of CFS.

Hundreds of stakeholders from different sectors, incuding several parliamentarians, participated in the various consutations and preparatory meetings held in Europe, Africa, Asia, Near East, Latin America, and North America.

These Guidelines represent a concrete tool in the hands of governments, UN agencies, and other development actors that provide guidance on policies and interventions to address malnutrition in all its forms through a holistic ‘food systems’ perspective. A holistic perspective that considers food systems in their totality and looks at the multi-dimensional causes of malnutrition.

The Guidelines provide a framework to bring together the various actors that are involved in food systems. A framework that recognizes that the various parts of the food systems are interconnected, that any action or decision to address one aspect of a food system would impact other aspects of the same food system.

They recognize the importance of implementing coordinated and multisectoral interventions within and across food systems, and their constituent elements - food supply chains, food environments, consumer behaviour – in order to improve their ability to deliver healthy diets and to generate positive environmental outcomes.

The guidelines aim at promoting policy coherence and at reducing policy fragmentation between relevant sectors like health, agriculture, education, environment, gender, social protection, trade and employment - all sectors that have an impact on food systems and nutrition.  FAO, and its partnes within UN Nutrition, are helping us to promote the Guidelines, in the field, and through development of a “Evidence Platform” that provides technical references for most of the VG’s 105 recommendations.

Excellencies,

The millions of people around the world that are suffering are not mere statistics. These are parents going through the torment of watching their children go hungry. Mothers and fathers deciding which meals to skip, which ailment needs a visit to the doctor, or deciding if their children continue in school. 

These are your constituencies that are counting on you for public policy changes that will improve their lives.

As the First Parliamentary Summit held in Madrid in 2018 clearly stated, “Parliamentary alliances are key to positioning the fight against hunger and malnutrition at the highest level of political agendas”.

You have the power and mandate ranging from representation to legislation, budget and oversight.  Placing sustainable food systems and healthy diets top of national and local agendas is in your hands.

The policy tools we endorse at CFS exist to guide you. They highlight the key role you as Parliamentarians and your sub-national, national and regional alliances play in promoting the adoption of policies, legislative and regulatory frameworks, raising awareness and promoting dialogue among relevant stakeholders, and allocating resources for the implementation of policies and programmes to achieve healthy diets through sustainable food systems.

As I said, it is time to work together. It is time for Parliamentarians and the Committee on World Food Security to strengthen linkages and develop new forms of collaboration.

I look forward to seeing you at  the upcoming 50^th CFS plenary taking place from 10 to 13 October in Rome and virtually.  The Plenary already features parliamentarians from Argentina and Tanzania as keynote speakers. We also have a side event on the role of parliamentarians and their alliances in strengthening legal frameworks for food security and nutrition organized by your alliances.

Let this be a start of a long term partnership between CFS and parliamentarian alliances across the world for food security and nutrition.

Thanks for your attention