World
Food
Summit

13-17 November 1996 - Rome, Italy

15. The Conference reiterated its full support for the convening of the World Food Summit, in Rome, in November 1996, and encouraged the continuation of broad-based, participatory preparations for the Summit. With a view toward contributing an Asia-Pacific perspective to the Summit preparation, the Conference considered the World Food Summit Draft Policy Statement and Plan of Action, and the Secretariat document on Food Security Situation and Issues in Asia and the Pacific . All delegations present contributed fully to the discussion under these agenda items which were considered in parallel.

16. The Conference took note of the outcome of the FAO/NGO Regional Consultation for Asia and the Pacific on the World Food Summit, held in Bangkok in April 1996. It welcomed the Consultation report and declaration, and oral summaries presented by participants of the Consultation, as valuable inputs to its discussions. The useful contributions of all NGOs, IGOs, United Nations bodies and Specialized Agencies, and other international organizations participating in the Conference were acknowledged.

17. Given the extreme diversity of social conditions and resource endowments, and the uneven levels of agricultural and economic development in the region, it was not surprising that delegates revealed a wide range of perspectives on the issues of food security and preparations for the World Food Summit. Nonetheless, the Conference reached common agreement on a number of points. In particular, the Conference noted:

• impressive progress achieved in Asia and the Pacific in the past two decades in improving food security, but also noted that such progress was not universal;
• predictions that expanding populations and rapid economic growth in the region may lead to sharply increased demands for food and energy in the near future, as well as increased pressures on the environment;
• that LIFDCs at the low end of the food security spectrum could remain at risk to fluctuations in production, natural disasters, fluctuations in international prices, and economic downturns in the foreseeable future;
• the findings of the Regional Commission on Food Security for Asia and the Pacific that vulnerability to food insecurity could be attributed to many factors, as outlined in the report of its Seventh Session;
• that the policy options needed for dealing with food security issues exist, but that the political commitment and concerted ground-level action had been lacking in many LIFDCs;
• that clear definitions of food security, self-sufficiency, and sustainable development were needed;

18. Some countries urged the international donor community to increase food aid and logistics support to improve food security in LIFDCs.

19. The Conference endorsed seven priority actions for regional food security as outlined in Appendix F. These were under the headings of: (i) raising productivity and output in the food sector; (ii) arresting and reversing agricultural land degradation and water loss; (iii) improving preparedness for food shortages due to natural disasters; (iv) improving food marketing efficiency; (v) minimizing the risks and maximizing the opportunities of trade-based supply stabilization; (vi) protecting vulnerable groups; and (vii) alleviating malnutrition. It recommended that the consensus be transmitted to the Committee on World Food Security as Asia-Pacifc's collective perspective on policies and priority actions needed to achieve food security, and that it be given full consideration in the formulation of the World Food Summit Policy Statement and Plan of Action on World Food Security.

20. The Conference urged FAO to continue indepth studies of the impacts of the Uruguay Round Agreement on food security.

21. The Conference endorsed the idea of launching the "Food for All Campaign" during the World Food Summit as a means of highlighting awareness of food security issues, mobilizing resources and broad support in the fight against hunger and malnutrition, and ensuring long-term follow-up to the initiatives agreed to by the Summit.

Appendix F

The Twenty-third FAO Regional Conference for Asia and the Pacific agreed that:

1. Regional Conferences are expected to consider regional dimensions of food security and identify regional priorities and actions to eradicate hunger and malnutrition and achieve lasting food security for all.
2. The considerable progress made in improving aggregate per caput food availability in the region in the past two decades was achieved through domestic production and assisted by imports and stocks.
3. The absolute number of chronically undernourished in the region remains large at about half a billion, accounting for some 67 percent of the world's total.
4. The aggregate food supply for the region as a whole is not the greatest problem; the problem now and in the near future is its inequitable distribution at the country and household levels.
5. There are a number of factors that require careful monitoring such as: expected increase in food demand and quality due to population growth and economic development, structural changes in food supply/demand due to rapid and dynamic economic transformation, and natural disasters.
6. The existing hunger and malnutrition problems need to be urgently addressed in the region, and that regional food security has multiple dimensions. Some countries have concerns regarding food supply instability and mid- to long-term availability, and stress domestic food production. Other countries consider that food security in the region would improve with further trade liberalization based on comparative advantage.
7. There is a necessity for human resource development and sustainable management and use of available agricultural, forestry, and fishery resources.
8. The region is disaster prone owing to environmental degradation and rapidly rising population densities and migrations to vulnerable areas.
9. Some countries consider that the multiple functions of agriculture will contribute to food security and also help to redress the excessive rate of rural-urban migration confronting many countries and enhance social stability.
10. There is diversity among the countries of this region and differences in views on some issues relative to food security and comparative advantage.
11. The importance of adopting food secuirty and commodity policies based on a combination of domestic production, imports, and reserve stocks is stressed. Clear definitions of food security, self-sufficiency, and sustainable development were needed. It is the right of each country to choose its own strategy and action plan to attain food security according to its own situation.
12. Member countries, individually and collectively, should carry out the following priority actions to achieve sustainable food security within the proposed framework of the World Food Summit Global Plan of Action.

Priority Actions

To raise food output through productivity gains from improved technology, management, and efficiency of capital use, especially in LIFDCs and developing coutries by:

1. Raising the past decade's low production growth rates of staple food commodities, particularly cereals, pulses, and roots and tubers, primarily through yield- and cropping-intensity improvements;
2. Continuing the past decade's high meat and milk production growth rate mainly through improvements in technology and management;
3. Increasing aquaculture output at more sustainable yield-derived growth rates against the explosive area-cum-intensity-led growth rate of the past decade.

At the national level:

1. Identify high potential areas which may also include rainfed and upland areas for accelerated cereal, livestock and aquaculture production and also other food commodities which may be important to the concerned country like roots and tubers, pulses, and fruits and vegetables;
2. Develop intensive support services to raise productivity especially input supply, credit, marketing, and extension for these high potential areas;
3. Extend water control facilities and improve the management of water control systems through participatory methods and the small command area approach;
4. Strengthen National Agricultural Research Systems stressing the development of environmentally-friendly policies and technologies such as integrated pest management, integrated plant nutrition systems, farmer-centred resource management, biotechnology and others;
5. Remove barriers to technology adoption and investments such as exploitative tenancy arrangements, irrational taxes, transportation bottlenecks and inefficient marketing systems;
6. Strengthen agricultural policy regimes to improve the terms of trade of producers paying special attention to input supply and producer prices;
7. Improve the investment climate in the food sector giving high priority to rationalising interest, exchange, and labour rates and general price levels, tax relief, infrastructure support and other investment benefits;
8. Introduce the participatory approach to intensive production planning and implementation to mobilise contributions from non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and concerned communities; and
9. Develop a technology-based farmer-driven food-security strategy and a nutrition strategy, and action plans for both, and simultaneously build an enabling environment (i.e. the technical, managerial and investment capacity for the plan to be implemented effectively).

At the sub-regional and regional levels:

1. Strengthen TCDC/ECDC through existing crop, fisheries (including disease control in aquaculture) and livestock research development agencies in the region;
2. Seek to broaden technical cooperation in the region;
3. Promote intra-regional private sector investment flows for food production and trade by setting up appropriate rules and regulations for foreign investment in this sector.

To conserve and improve agricultural land and water resources by implementing a comprehensive action plan to follow-through with commitments made at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development's Earth Summit.

At the national level:

1. Empower and fund adequately the authorities responsible for land and water conservation and improvement;
2. Decentralise land and water resource management and ensure peoples' participation;
3. Refine and improve property or user rights and obligations for public and private resources;
4. Seek to ensure sustainable limits and conditions for agriculture, fishery and forestry resource utilisation;
5. Develop and extend environmentally-friendly farming systems and methods based on biological and software technologies;
6. Seek to strengthen the system for charging water-use;
7. Strengthen the system for preventing pollution;
8. Seek to regulate the loss of prime agricultural land to housing and industry; and
9. Provide a framework to encourage reclamation of degraded land through reforestation and other rehabilitation measures.

At the sub-regional and regional levels:

1. Promote TCDC/ECDC in land and water resource management and improvement through FAO, UNEP, the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) and other international agencies and NGOs;
2. Establish and strengthen riparian and water-shed communities for joint management of the resources; and
3. Encourage foreign investment and technology transfer in land and water improvement projects and reduction of marine pollution.

1. Reduce the incidence and impact of natural disasters;
2. Limit the vulnerability of populations to natural disasters;
3. Avoid hunger and malnutrition due to natural disasters; and
4. Ensure the quick and effective rehabilitation of farming systems and livelihoods following natural disasters.

At the national level:

1. Commitment to a long-term integrated programme for disaster prevention and mitigation based on self-reliance which should include among other measures minimising deforestation, reforestation, protecting watersheds and drainage systems and undertaking other conservation measures;
2. Develop cropping patterns, plant varieties and other technologies and infrastructure which might help vulnerable areas withstand natural disasters;
3. Strengthen the basic elements of preparedness, namely, emergency foodgrain reserve stock, the early warning system, the standby natural disaster unit and the food-relief contingency plan; and
4. Make long-term investments in physical infrastructure, education and employment and income generation in disaster-prone areas.

At the sub-regional and regional levels:

1. Improve national early warning systems and establish sub-regional/regional early warning systems; and
2. Strengthen the ASEAN and SAARC collective emergency food reserves and establish other reserves where feasible and cost effective.

To improve the technical and pricing efficiency of food marketing systems.

At the national level:

1. Appropriate liberalization of food markets to improve the business environment subject to food security safeguards;
2. Build a network of wholesale markets and improve transportation systems and other post-harvest facilities for the food sector;
3. Strengthen marketing institutions, particularly independent private firms and cooperatives; and
4. Improve marketing support services especially information, credit, research, training and extension.

At the sub-regional and regional levels:

1. Organise TCDC in food marketing systems' improvement through regional associations such as AFMA (Association of Food Marketing Agencies in Asia and the Pacific); and
2. Encourage technology transfer from developed countries in the important areas of grading, packing, storage, processing and other post-harvest operations.

1. To ensure regular and reliable foreign sources of supply for food import requirements;
2. To enhance the capacity to finance food import needs;
3. To improve domestic marketing efficiency; and
4. To stabilize food supply by combining all available measures including domestic production.

At the national level:

1. Liberalize food trade in line with the provisions of the Uruguay Round Agreement;
2. Maximise foreign exchange earnings by utilizing the full benefits of comparative advantage in commodities production;
3. Strengthen domestic market mechanisms for price and supply stability including among others, early warning and market information systems, public and private stocking, and marketing infrastructure, institutions and services; and
4. Increase stability of food availability including domestic production.

At the sub-regional and regional levels:

1. Promote food trade liberalization within the six formal and informal sub-regional trade and investment cooperation zones;
2. Pursue long-term food trade arrangements such as the ASEAN Principle of First Refusal, Indonesian-Filipino food loans, Malaysian palm oil credit facility, Thai rice credit facility and the Chinese-Sri Lankan food-for-rubber barter, and other growth-area cooperation.

1. To protect food entitlements of the households living at or below nationally-drawn poverty lines;
2. To alleviate poverty among the hardcore poor such as rural landless workers, subsistence farmers, fisherfolk, and deprived urban households; and
3. To provide basic staple food needs to the destitute, especially women and children in such households.

At the national level:

1. Maintain cost-effective PDS (Public Distribution Systems) targeted at the very poorest and the destitute households;
2. Establish a lean-income protection scheme including food-based minimum wages, food stamps, food-linked wage increments and employees' provident funds;
3. Develop off-farm employment and income-generation programs based on investment incentives for the private sector in vulnerable rural communities;
4. Improve farming systems in rainfed and upland areas to raise the production and incomes of subsistence farmers;
5. Encourage non-governmental community welfare and self-help programmes funded by contributions and company set-asides; and
6. Actively pursue strategies defined at both the Cairo Population Conference and the Beijing Conference on Women, as applicable to each country.

At the sub-regional and regional levels:

1. Collaborate in the development of vulnerable group protection models covering, among others, household food security indicators, identification and monitoring methodologies, employment and income-generation programs and public distribution schemes;
2. Promote legal and orderly mechanisms for inter-country labour migration;
3. Continue food-aid flows including contributions from the more affluent developing countries.

To implement the national plan of action on nutrition (NPAN) in accordance with the commitments made at the ICN 1992.

At the national level:

1. Formulate and refine NPANs if not already carried out;
2. Promote, protect and support breastfeeding; and
3. Encourage multi-party participation in the implementation of the NPAN including local governments, NGOs, community leaders, private enterprises and the beneficiaries.

At the sub-regional and regional levels:

1. Maximise the use of human resources and facilities for nutrition research and development; and
2. Exchange experiences in the implementation of NPANs.
   Responsibilities for implementing priority actions

   The national governments have the primary responsibility for creating the conditions required for food security in their countries. National governments, according to each country's conditions and capabilities, are responsible for creating an economic and social environment conducive to fast, sustainable and equitable growth in which agricultural and rural development must play a central role. More specifically, national governments will achieve food security through strong policy commitment to the priority actions outlined above. This will require the building of appropriate structures and mechanisms and the involvement, not only of all relevant public entities but also of the private sector and civil society in general.

   Governments in the region also have shared responsibilities with other countries within and outside the region, international and non-governmental organisations, in the pursuance of food security goals according to each country's conditions and capabilities.

   Responsibilities at the sub-regional and regional levels:

   The governments of the region, in accordance with their national laws and regulations should act collectively to:

   1. Reinforce regional cooperation mechanisms in agriculture and food policies for food security, including the strengthening of Asia-Pacific inter-governmental organisations and research institutions;
   2. Encourage the exchange of technologies for food and agricultural production, including the establishment of technical cooperation networks;
   3. Facilitate intra-regional trade and investment flows especially in food and agriculture, fisheries and forestry;
   4. Encourage investments and technology transfer, especially in the sciences of biotechnology, environmental protection and rehabilitation, management of water resources, and soil improvement.

   Responsibilities at the international level:

   The international organisations and the donor community should:

   1. Help to define the scope and modalities for global cooperation in the critical areas of food security including, among others, managing fragile ecosystems, reforestation, promoting sustainable agriculture and rural development, improving household food security, food safety and balanced diets;
   2. Improve the global monitoring system for food security and nutrition at both regional and international levels;
   3. Encourage investment programmes for food security and nutrition projects in LIFDCs;
   4. Extend sources and channels for investment assistance and technology transfer by involving private-sector companies and NGO networks;
   5. Ensure implementation of the Uruguay Round Decision and Measures Concerning the Possible Negative Effects of the Reform Programme on Least Developed and Net Food Importing Countries; and
   6. Assist national governments to achieve macro-economic stability and food-system efficiency in keeping with social objectives.

   The expected role of civil society

   Farmers, individuals, private institutions, and NGOs are expected to work towards:

   1. The realisation of sustainable agriculture and rural development;
   2. Protection of vulnerable groups including the rural landless, subsistence farmers, tribals, remote communities, shifting cultivators, small fisherfolk, urban unemployed and underemployed and other deprived groups;
   3. Empowerment of women leading to an enhanced role in household food security and nutrition;
   4. Basic education in food security, nutrition and health; and
   5. Compliance with laws, rules and regulations deriving from international agreements and/or commitments made at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, the International Conference on Nutrition, the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations, the Cairo Conference on Population and Development, the Beijing Women's Conference, and others.

   Among others, these duties of individual members of society and their organisations have taken on added importance as regional member governments increasingly liberalize and privatize economic activities, especially in the food sector.