“The Global Food Crisis: Why are the World’s Children Suffering?”

Before the Congressional Children’s Caucus, Congressional Health Caucus and the Foreign Affairs Committee on Africa and Global Health

May 8, 2008

Introduction

First, I want to thank the Congressional Children’s Caucus, the Congressional Global Health Caucus, and the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Africa and Global Health for holding this briefing today.

My name is Robert Zachritz and I am the director for Advocacy and Government Relations for World Vision. World Vision is a Christian humanitarian organization working to eliminate the root causes of poverty in nearly 100 countries.

The topic is very timely, with global food prices rising 57 percent from March 2007 – March 2008. I also want to take this opportunity to thank the U.S. Congress and the American people for their generosity. The U.S. government has provided more than half of all food aid globally in recent years.

Macro situation, prior to rising food prices

Riots in hungry cities around the world have focused attention on a daily fact of life: One in eight people around the world go hungry every day. This reflects the reality that more than 850 million people live in extreme poverty and hunger. One billion people live on $1 a day or less. As global food prices rise, this $1 a day buys even less and, as a result, more people are driven into poverty. Part of the short-term answer to this challenge is to offer immediate help to those who are now being driven to live on 50 cents a day.

Part of the long-term solution is to give people economic opportunities to buy and produce food. As a person’s income rises from $1 a day to $2 a day, a person becomes able to provide a very basic meal to sustain themselves, removing them from an immediate danger zone of extreme hunger.

Macro situation, rising food prices

The current food crisis is exacerbating an already unacceptable situation. Increases in food prices could push another 100 million people deeper into poverty. The rising food prices are hurting children the most. Hunger contributes to the preventable deaths of 5 million children under age 5 worldwide each year. This equals 14,000 children a day, or, one child every seven seconds.

Malnutrition threatens to prevent tens of millions more children from reaching their full potential. When prices are higher, people’s budgets buy less. They also scale down the number of meals they eat and they start eating less-nutritious food. For example, recent news reports have talked about how in the United States, school lunch programs are buying less nutritious food in order to hold down costs. For people living on $1 a day or less, this means cutting out meals. For example, in Afghanistan, World Vision is getting reports of people who used to have a daily diet of tea and bread. With the increase in global food prices, many can afford only the tea.

Response

The global community needs to respond to address both the short-term hunger crisis and the longer-term sustainable issues. In the short-term, the World Food Programme emergency appeal of $755 million must be met to just maintain existing programs. Meeting the WFP appeal ensures existing programs continue at current levels but does not make an additional dent to reduce global hunger by one-half in 2015, which is the 1^st Millennium Development Goal. The long-term solutions include investing in sustainable agriculture and ensuring access to markets, access to credit, and access to agriculture inputs like seeds and fertilizer. It also includes successfully finalizing the development round of the World Trade Organization’s global trade talks in a manner that benefits the developing countries.

Legislation

The Bush Administration and the U.S. Congress have some upcoming opportunities to address both the short-term and long-term issues surrounding the increasing food prices.

World Vision is pleased that Congress’ final agreement on the next five-year Farm bill will provide a “safebox” for long-term development programs of approximately 35 percent of all U.S. international food assistance. This will ensure long-term solutions go along with the short-term response. World Vision also applauds President Bush’s release in April of $200 million from the Bill Emerson Humanitarian Trust to deal with emergency needs now.

Second, Congress is preparing a FY 2008 and FY 2009 Supplemental Appropriations bill which almost doubles the President’s request last week for an additional $770 million over the next two years on top of his earlier $350 million request. The House of Representatives is proposing $1.865 billion in additional funds over the next two years to respond to this hunger crisis in cash and commodities. It will include $1.245 billion for PL 480, title II and $200 million for long-term development assistance and $400 million for disaster assistance. This is all in addition to the annual appropriation for food aid of around $1.2 billion.

Finally, Congress is considering a bipartisan Global AIDS, TB, and Malaria bill, which provides $50 billion over the next five years. This legislation includes a component to ensure people are getting nutritious food in the regions most affected by these diseases.

Conclusion

Thanks again for this opportunity. I would be happy to answer any questions.