At UN food summit, Ban Ki-moon warns of rise in child hunger deaths.

At a recent summit in Rome, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged donors to help the 1 billion people on the planet who do not have enough to eat. He also pointed out that more than 17,000 children die of starvation every day. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization, which organized the summit, hoped that wealthy countries would increase their annual food aid from $7.9 billion to $44 billion. The new summit also makes no mention of the UN's Millennium Development Goal, which is suppose to cut the number of hungry people in half by 2015. The summit is trying to make the world's richest nations to make good on the promises that they have made, but this seems unlikely. This is unlikely because out of the 60 world leaders who are attending, most are from Africa and Latin America. This reason this summit is so important is because of the world's food supply. Aid groups say that it is outrageous that malnutrition still exists when the world produces a surplus of food. For example, cereal crops this year are expected to be the second largest ever. Even with the surplus of food, the number of hungry people rose this year to 1.02 billion people as a result of the global economic crisis, high food and fuel process, drought, and conflict. Mr. Ban also points out that climate change and population increases are exacerbating an already acute global food crisis. This summit won't be able to solve the growing hunger crisis all by itself, but hopefully it can raise awareness so that the international community realizes that this is a world wide problem that it needs to solve.

By: William Miller
Source: Christian Science Monitor