|
Help for small farmers and vulnerable households
Basseterre -- July 11, 2008 -- A call by St. Kitts and
Nevis’ Prime Minister Hon. Dr. Denzil L. Douglas at last month’s World
Food Security Summit in Rome for the FAO to assist Member Countries
with seeds, fertilizer and other inputs to assist the farmers to carry
out a rapid production of agricultural products has not fallen on deaf
years.
Wednesday the FAO announced the approval of a series of projects in 48
countries for a total value of US$21 million to help small farmers and
vulnerable households mitigate the negative effects of rising food and
input prices. The projects will provide farmers with agricultural
inputs as of this month for an expected duration of one year.
“We need help and we need it immediately,” Prime Minister Douglas told
the several Heads of State and Government as well as numerous Ministers
of agriculture, forestry, fisheries, water, energy and environment at
the Summit.
Dr. Douglas had said there was an urgent need to develop measures to
ensure that the adverse effects of the higher food prices on the poor
are minimized and that sustainable measures are developed and
implemented to reduce poverty.
FAO said the assistance to the 48 countries will be funded by the
Technical Cooperation Programme – i.e. FAO's own resources – they are
part of FAO's Initiative on soaring food prices (ISFP).
With six countries already benefiting for a total amount of nearly
US$2.8 million, FAO's own funding under the Initiative on soaring food
prices now covers 54 countries.
The immediate objective of these projects is to ensure the success of
the next planting seasons and, in the longer term, demonstrate that by
increasing the supply of key agricultural inputs, such as seeds and
fertilizers, small farmers will be able to rapidly increase their food
production.
Increased food production would help cushion small farmers, who often
have to buy part of their food from markets with rising food prices and
would, hopefully, lead to a surplus production that could be sold,
increasing their income and facilitating the access to food of the
rural and urban population.
The provision of seeds, fertilizers and other agricultural inputs to
small farmers is intended to encourage donors, financial institutions
and national governments to support the provision of inputs on a much
larger scale, according to FAO experts who stress that their Initiative
is intended to produce a salutary catalytic effect that will encourage
development partners to contribute to similar projects, but on a larger
scale.
According to FAO, countries most affected, especially in Africa, will
need at least a total of US$1.7 billion to start reviving agricultural
systems that have been neglected for several decades. And this amount
is just for immediate and short term measures during 2008-2009.
The unprecedented hike in food prices, which rose 52 percent between
2007 and 2008, has had severe economic, social and political
consequences in poor countries. And high prices of agricultural inputs
have become a major obstacle to developing countries' efforts to
increase agricultural production.
For the period January 2007 to April 2008, fertilizer prices in particular shot up at a much faster rate than food prices.
Anticipating the widespread impact and grave nature of soaring food
prices, in December 2007, FAO launched its Initiative on soaring food
prices to help vulnerable countries put in place urgent measures to
boost food supplies by ensuring the success of their agricultural
campaigns and to provide policy support to improve access to food.
The 48 new countries benefiting from FAO's drive are: Afghanistan,
Angola, Armenia, Bangladesh, Barbados, Belize, Benin, Bhutan, Burundi,
Cambodia, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Comoros, Democratic
Republic of Congo, Djibouti, Dominica, Eritrea, Grenada, Guinée,
Guinée-Bissau, Guyana, Honduras, Jamaica, Kenya, Kyrgystan, DPR Korea,
Lesotho, Madagascar, Mali, Mongolia, Nigeria, Nepal, Nicaragua,
Pakistan, Philippines, Rwanda, St Kitts and Nevis, St Vincent and the
Grenadine, Sierra Leone, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Suriname, Swaziland, Tchad,
Timor-Leste, Togo, Yemen, Zambia.
|
