There is more than enough food produced today to feed everyone, yet about 821 million people are chronically undernourished. Achieving food security for everyone requires an integrated approach from all stakeholders, including from governments. Bringing the hunger number down to zero by 2030 will require appropriate legislation backed by the necessary budgets and proper monitoring, allowing for just and long-lasting legal frameworks.
Here are ten ideas for how members of parliament can help achieve SDG 2 (Zero Hunger):
1. Establish the principles that guide policy towards ending hunger and malnutrition.
A country's constitution is its supreme law, the foundation on which citizens' rights and the state's obligations are built. By including the right to adequate food in their constitutions, countries give this goal the greatest guarantee of success. When programmes are supported by legislation, they become government policy.
To date, 30 countries have explicitly recognized the human right to adequate food in their constitutions. These countries include South Africa, the Philippines, Ukraine, Zimbabwe, Egypt, Fiji and Guyana. The most recent example is Nepal, which received support from FAO during the process of adding the right to food to its constitution in 2015.
2. Define the rules of the game when it comes to overseeing laws and organizing their implementation.
Legislators should criticize, question and authorize other branches of government. The tools that they have at their disposal for ensuring and demanding accountability include Question Time sessions, the approval of budgets and selection committees.
For example, in Honduras, government regulatory bodies are required to oversee the Law that extends financial credit to rural women and produce annual accountability reports.
3. Draft laws that incorporate food and nutritional security while also considering the needs of all sectors.
Ensuring food and nutritional security requires the involvement of the various sectors that make up the food system. This means considering the needs of small farmers, pastoralists and artisanal fishers and helping them to build capacity through social protection initiatives that target the most vulnerable parts of the food system.
As part of Bolivia's Law on Food in Schools, microenterprises made up of rural women hired by local authorities to prepare and distribute school meals. The menus, which are designed with input from both the school board and the municipality's nutritionist, include regional products.
4. Leverage the knowledge of academic institutions.
Legislators need to understand the extent of a problem and be able to measure the impact of policies. To do so, they can capitalize on the expertise of the academic community while drafting, implementing and overseeing legislation or public policy relating to the right to adequate food.
In Spain, the University of Oviedo's World Food Governance Research Centre was created to encourage research on topics related to food and nutritional security, evaluate policy, assess consistency between programmes and produce an annual report reviewing strategy and best practices.