According to the head of the World Trade Organization (WTO), Director-General Pascal Lamy, International trade helps solve food crisis, and had not been part of the problem for the increased food insecurity of the last year and the increased level of poverty.
“To suggest that less trade, and greater self-sufficiency, are the solutions to food security, would be to argue that trade was itself to blame for the crisis,” he said.
While on the contrary the United Nations special rapporteur on the right to food, Olivier De Schutter, has made considerable statements saying the fact of heavy reliance by states on food trade in an effort to gain food security was condemnable and that that states needed to become more self reliant. There are many supporters on both sides of the debate, while trade does generally lower prices, many states have hit disproportional levels of reliance on foreign aid and food and consumer goods, a fate which can lead to potential disasters in times of conflict for example.
The General Director of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, Jacques Diouf, recently reported that the number of hungry could hit 1 billion, in spite of the fact that food prices have been significantly dropping. According to reports some 104 million more people look to go hungry this year, which could lead to some 1 billion people will face poverty and hungry by the end of 2009.
The fact that we have faced a global food crisis and poverty is on the increase, leads many to question either side of the debate and wonder if an eual balance of both sustainablity and trade maybe a better solution then trying to decide what side of the fence to stand on.
