World Food Day Ceremony

Diouf calls for rapid elimination of hunger

World Food Day: Official aid to agriculture to increase

FAO Director-General Jacques Diouf
16 October 2009, Rome - FAO Director-General Jacques Diouf today called on world leaders to reach a “broad consensus on the total and rapid elimination of hunger” when they gather in Rome for the World Summit on Food Security of Heads of State and Government on November 16-18.

In his annual address to mark World Food Day, Diouf also urged leaders to agree to increase agriculture’s share of official development assistance to 17 percent, the level it was in 1980, from the current five percent.

The theme of this year’s World Food Day is “Achieving food security in times of crisis”. Diouf said the current economic crisis that had forced 105 million more people into hunger was “historically unprecedented” as it directly followed the 2008 world food price crisis.

For more information: www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/36350/ico de/

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items are from 16 Oct 2009.