The Global Food Crisis     

What is it?

• Food prices have risen 83% on average compared with three years ago. As a result, many more people are going hungry or have to choose between food and other things that they need, like getting medical help or going to school.
• Because most people living in poverty spend 50-80% of their income on food, the rise in prices hits them hardest.
• Persistent hunger affects 854 million people around the world. The rise in prices is expected to add push another 290 million people over the edge.
• In rural areas, landless labourers, nomadic pastoralists and women are the groups most severely affected.
• Even small-scale farmers face hunger, because many of them do not produce enough to satisfy all their needs.

Why is it happening?

• Climate change is certainly a major cause. Unusually extreme weather, including droughts, floods and storms, have reduced crop yield in many parts of the world.
• The World Bank says the massive diversion of corn to produce ethanol in North America was a trigger for the rise in food prices.
• The rising cost of fossil fuels too has driven up the cost of fertilizer and other inputs that farmers need
• Lack of government investment in small-scale food production in recent decades has made it harder for farmers to take advantage of higher prices and produce more food.

What can be done?

We need to:

• Encourage and support farmers who grow food in sustainable ways, both locally and internationally.
• Become more environmentally responsible to minimize the effects of climate change.

The Canadian government needs to:

• Provide urgent assistance to countries facing immediate food shortages.
• Move quickly to reduce Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions, and take leadership at the United Nations in forging a new post-Kyoto deal.
• Redirect Canada’s ethanol subsidies toward alternative fuels that do not drive up the price of food.
• Increase Canada’s development assistance and use more of it to help small-scale farmers produce more food
• Provide additional assistance to help poor countries adapt to climate change.

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