Late in November I joined Minister of International Cooperation Bev Oda as a member of the Canadian delegation to the World Summit on Food Security in Rome. Hosted by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the summit was part of the international community’s continuing attempt to address world hunger and malnutrition.

It was clear to conference participants that the situation has reached catastrophic proportions. With every passing minute, 10 children die of hunger and malnutrition in underdeveloped countries; a situation that FAO president Jacques Diouf rightly calls “a moral outrage, an economic absurdity and…a serious threat to our collective peace and security.” The FAO estimates the number of hungry or undernourished people in the world has now risen to over one billion — that’s almost one in six people on this planet.

The United Nations predicts the world population will peak at 9.1 billion, by 2050, that means the world will require a 70 per cent increase in food production to meet the rise in demand. The issue is whether the world is up to the challenge.

Before the conference began, participants had already signalled their unwillingness to heed FAO’s call to commit 17 per cent of their foreign aid budgets for agricultural development, which UN officials placed at an annual cost of $44 billion. It was clear to me that — as with climate change — there is a demoralizing disconnect between the words and deeds on the part of the international community on the issue of world hunger and food security.

To address the issues of world hunger and food security, developed countries must shift from policies overemphasizing food aid as an answer — a measure that often devastates local farms by flooding their markets with food — toward strategies that seek to strengthen the agricultural sectors in developing countries. Only through the empowerment of their own agricultural producers can developing countries effectively reduce poverty and malnutrition. Developed countries must end market-distorting subsidies that create an uneven playing field, and assist developing countries in fostering correct irrigation processes, developing seed banks, transferring new technologies in crop science, and ensuring adequate food storage to restore security and sovereignty to food production in developing countries. There is strong evidence this view has taken hold among world leaders. At the L’Aquila summit, in July, G8 countries committed to spending $20 billion US on food development over the next three years, although there is no evidence this money is being spent.

Eventually discouraged by the UN proceedings, I attended several so-called “shadow conferences,” — seminars organized by grassroots organizations, non-governmental organizations and farmers who had gathered elsewhere in Rome to offer alternative ideas in anticipation of the summit’s failure. They stressed the most effective way to provide relief is by helping small-holdings farmers through local farm organizations and reputable non-government people and organizations who understand the local conditions and impediments to agricultural production in specific regions.

As emphasized by columnist Owen Roberts recently in this newspaper, developed nations continue to make stunning advancements in agricultural technology—the sharing of which can improve the lives of millions. There is no question the University of Guelph and others have a strategic role to play in helping combat this global crisis, and are committed to doing so. The FAO reports: “the world has the resources, technology, and know-how to eradicate hunger now and for the foreseeable future.” Indeed, rapid progress is possible, if real action is taken and policy is informed by the moral imperative that all human beings have a basic right to food.

Late into the conference, I came across a plaque commemorating the founding of FAO headquarters, dated Oct.16, 1945. I was struck by the inscription, which read “Representatives of 44 nations met and established the Food and Agriculture Organization, first of the new UN Agencies. Thus for the first time, nations organized to raise levels of nutrition and improve production and distribution of food and agricultural products.” Sixty-four years have passed since those words were written. It’s true that without international efforts to date, the crisis would certainly be worse, but crucial questions remain. How far are we willing to go when one-sixth of humanity is in dire need, and what will be the consequences for all of us if we fail them?

Frank Valeriote is Guelph’s Member of Parliament.