UN: Food costs hitting world's poor

Al Jazeera, May 23, 2008

The UN food agency says more than 800 million people face food deprivation amid rising prices [Reuters] Food import costs to the world's poorest nations are set to rise by 40 per cent in 2008 on the previous year, a report by the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) says. The bill for food imports to poor countries will reach $169bn this year, the Rome-based organisation said on Thursday. The overall cost of food is set to rise by 53 per cent from 2007, the report says. "Rising food prices are bound to worsen the already unacceptable level of food deprivation suffered by 854 million people," Hafez Ghanem, the FAO's assistant director-general, said in the report. "We are facing the risk that the number of hungry will increase by many more millions of people." 'Rights violated' In video Rice prices rocket in France UN report predicts further pressure on global poor Should prices continue to rise at their present rate, by the end of 2008 the annual food import basket for Low Income Food Deficit Countries (LIFDCs) could cost four times as much as it did in 2000. Rising food prices have led to protests around the world in recent months. A senior UN body also said on Thursday that the fallout from the rising cost of food around the world constituted a threat to basic human rights. Louise Arbour, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, told the UN Human Rights Council that the "well-being and rights of countless people" was being threatened by the soaring cost of corn, rice, wheat and other staple foods. "This crisis boils down to a lack of access to adequate food. Such access is a right protected by international law," she said. Continued . . .