1. World food security is a common responsibility of mankind. The ultimate objective is to ensure that all people at all times are in a position to produce or procure the basic food they need.

2. Achievement of the "fundamental right of everyone to be free from hunger" depends utimately on the abolition of poverty. But the hungry cannot wait. The search for world food security must include immediate steps to help the distressed, as well as longer-term measures to bring about economic and social progress. No one can remain indifferent to the fate of those whose daily food is insecure.

3. The achievement of food security should be an integral objective of economic and social plans. Action should be aimed at three specific goals: attaining desirable levels of food production, increasing the stability of food supply, and ensuring access to food supplies on the part of those in need.

4. Food should not be used as a means of exerting political pressure.

1. Governments carry the primary responsibility for ensuring the food security of their peoples, and for banishing chronic hunger and malnutrition from their territory. They should give this objective an overriding priority.

2. Governments of developing countries should promote domestic food production as the first line of attack on food insecurity. They should avoid, as far as they can, the risks that result from an excessive dependence on food imports, notably for feeding urban populations ' In particular, they should ensure that city-dwellers do not acquire a permanent preference for imported basic foods which cannot be grown domestically.

3. Governments of developing countries should re-examine and, if necessary, change their national policies so as to stimulate food production. They should, in particular, ensure that farmers are given adequate incentives to grow more food. The review should extend to policies outside the agricultural sector but with a bearing on food security, such as demography.

4. Governments of developing countries should make advance arrangements for maintaining food security in times of difficulty, especially when faced with drought or other natural disaster. The measures adopted might include an early warning system to detect the buildup of an emergency, the creation of food reserves where this is feasible, and contingency plans for the distribution of relief supplies.

5. Governments of developing countries should undertake measures for improving the economic situation of population groups which are particularly disadvantaged, including those in remote parts of the country. Rural development activities, oriented specifically towards the needs of the poor, should be promoted with special emphasis on the participation of the small farmer. In general, while maintaining incentives for agricultural production, every encouragement should be given to measures which will increase the purchasing power of the poorest strata of the population, in line with the Programme of Action adopted by the World Conference on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development. Governments should make all efforts so that agricultural work receives a higher status.

6. Governments of developing countries should seek to make cooperative arrangements with each other for the purpose of strengthening food security. The specific activities to be carried out in common might include: regional early warning systems for detecting agricultural emergencies; joint activities to increase the availability of seeds, fertilizers and other inputs in the area; programmes for the control of migrant pests and diseases; the exchange of experience and information and possibly the creation of regional or subregional food reserves.

7. Governments should reaffirm their moral as well as economic and political commitment to cooperation with each other in strengthening global food security.

8. Governments of developed countries, whether they be exporters or importers, should consider the interests of the world as a whole when making their policy decisions on food production, stocks and imports. Similarly, arrangements which insulate domestic consumers from price swings in international markets should not result in increased hardship for the weakest and most vulnerable countries. The overall objective should be the development of a world food system characterized by stability and equity.

9. Emergency food aid and other forms of relief should continue to be provided generously to poorer countries. At the same time increasing importance should be attached to measures, in particular to promote agricultural production, which could prevent such emergencies arising in future.

10. Governments of developed countries should continue to seek more effective ways of helping low-income food-deficit countries to secure their imports of essential food supplies, as well as of fertilizers and other agricultural requisites, in times of difficulty. The problems to be envisaged include a major shortage of supplies on international markets, or an economic crisis in the importing country.

11. For many developing nations, food security also depends on their ability to export agricultural and other products in order to import foodstuffs. This fact should be taken into account by the governments of developed countries in negotiations on trade questions. The objective should thus be to recognise the moral dimension in trade relations with a view to striking an equitable balance between domestic interests and the good of the world as a whole.

12. Governments of developed countries should give a specially high priority to helping developing nations where a major effort is being made to overcome the problems of rural poverty, the principal cause of chronic hunger and malnutrition.

1. Non-governmental organizations with a concern for world food security can stimulate, support and complement the actions of governments, in developed and developing countries alike. In particular, they can help to create a climate of opinion favouring measures for food security, thus opening the way for additional steps by governments as suggested in this Compact. Furthermore, they can contribute directly, through operational and other activities, towards building up higher levels of food security in various parts of the Third World.

2. Non-governmental organizations can play an increasingly active role in enlightening public opinion about the problems of food security in an inter-dependent world. Besides the immediate challenge of hunger and malnutrition, they can also provide information on important issues relating to food security, such as the impact on the poorer nations of actions taken by the richer nations in the fields of trade, protectionism and economic adjustment.

3. Non-governmental organizations in all parts of the world can take the lead in organizing more frequent people-to-people contacts between countries, especially between countries at different levels of economic development. Such initiatives should aim at increasing mutual understanding, and at opening up avenues for possible cooperation in practical activities.

1. The individual is called upon not only to work for his own food security and that of his family, but also to recognise that he has a sacred obligation to concern himself with food security of those less fortunate than himself. Failure to provide succour when it is needed is a betrayal of man's duty to his fellow men.

2. At the practical level, individuals can play a unique role in keeping public opinion in the richer nations aware of the need for global cooperation in achieving world food security, which is often overshadowed by domestic problems. Individuals of every background can contribute towards building an atmosphere of concern for the world's food problems.

3. It is essential that work in agriculture (including not only the activities of farmers but also the efforts of researchers, extension agents and other professional categories) be given a higher status than it currently receives. Individuals can play a special role in creating a climate of opinion more favourable to work in agriculture and food production.

4. Individual farmers, in every country and climate, provide the indispensable basis for food security. But the farmer is responsible, not only for food production, but also for the conservation of the soil and other natural resources bequeathed by nature and our ancestors to us who are alive today. The farmer, as custodian of the land resource must conserve it for future generations, avoiding practices which result in erosion or other forms of destruction.

5. Individuals everywhere should interest themselves actively in the efforts of governments and organizations to promote development and food security. The concern of individuals creates the groundswell of support needed by non-governmental organizations. The work of these organizations, in turn, helps to mobilize public opinion for action by governments. Without the active interest of the man-in-the-street, little may be achieved. But interest does not mean blind support: criticism can be constructive. The enemy is indifference.