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FAO: 1.5b across globe facing starvation

(China Daily)
Updated: 2008-07-03 10:14

Rising land degradation reduces crop yields and may threaten food security of about a quarter of the world' population, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said on Wednesday.

A Somali refugee cooks outside a shelter in the Ifo 2 camp which hosts about 16,000 new refugees from Somalia in Dadaab, 400 km (245 miles) northeast of capital Nairobi, June 20, 2008. [Agencies]

Food security has been highlighted in recent months as soaring crop prices resulting from poor harvests, low stocks, high fuel prices and rising demand, risks causing starvation for millions of people in the developing world.

"An estimated 1.5 billion people, or a quarter of the world's population, depend directly on land that is being degraded," FAO said in a statement presenting a study based on data taken over a 20-year period.

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Long-term land degradation has been increasing around the world and affects more than 20 percent of all cultivated areas, 30 percent of forests and 10 percent of grasslands, FAO said.

Land erosion leads to reduced productivity, migration, food insecurity, damage to basic resources and ecosystems, loss of biodiversity and also contributes to increasing emission of heat-trapping gases, FAO said.

"The loss of biomass and soil organic matter releases carbon into the atmosphere and affects the quality of soil and its ability to hold water and nutrients," said Parviz Koohafkan, director of FAO's Land and Water Division. According to the study, land degradation is being driven mainly by poor land management.

$10b world disaster fund

The United Nations proposed on Tuesday a $10 billion global fund to help poor countries cope with natural disasters the world body said were occurring with ever more frequency and ferocity.

A UN report on factors creating world economic insecurity said the existing response to floods and earthquakes of emergency appeals and voluntary contributions should be boosted with a permanent facility, possibly under UN auspices.

More than four times as many disasters occurred annually between 2000 and 2006 than during the 1970s, the report said. The damage costs were seven times higher at an average of $83 billion per year.

Several schemes for disaster funds had been launched or proposed in recent years but these were too small to be effective, said the report.

"A global disaster mechanism ... needs to be established," that would not just tackle immediate relief needs but also invest in longer-term disaster reduction," Sha Zukang, UN under-secretary-general for economic and social affairs, said in an overview to the report.

Agencies