Hunger Summit delivers good result on nutrition but misses chance to support small-holder farmers

At the same time as the amazing Big IF Rally in London Prime Minister David Cameron hosted the Nutrition for Growth Event.

This event, known as the Hunger Summit, brought together leading figures from business, science, civil society and governments in the build-up to the G8 meeting in Enniskillen, Northern Ireland. On the table during discussions were the issues of child nutrition and investment in agriculture.

The meeting secured £2.7 billion to tackle global under-nutrition between now and 2020, with the UK committing an extra £375m of core funding and £280m of matched funding for the period.

Responding to the announcement, a spokesperson for the Enough Food for Everyone IF campaign said: “The Prime Minister has today put the scandal of under-nutrition firmly on the map. This is a turning point in tackling what is the biggest killer of children worldwide. 

“If today’s promises are delivered they could save the lives of almost two million children – an historic breakthrough in the fight against hunger. We now need to ensure that donors stump up the cash as quickly as possible, hungry children can’t wait.

But the spokesperson added: “A G8 deal on tax and land which helps poor countries is badly off track. The Prime Minister must urgently intervene in the next week to turn this around.”

And during the afternoon session of the Nutrition for Growth Event investment in agriculture in poor countries was discussed. With a £13.7bn gap in poor countries’ agricultural investment plans, delivery of concrete support for small-holder farmers was vital.

This was part of the New Alliance initiative launched in 2012, which aims to create a better environment for private sector investment in agriculture in poor countries. The overall aim of the initiative is to bring 50m people out of poverty over the next 10 years. 

Support to small farmers is crucial and provides the single biggest opportunity to reduce hunger, reduce poverty and increase productivity according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation yet, at the Nutrition for Growth Event, small farmers were again overlooked. 

CAFOD’s director of advocacy Neil Thorns said: “There has been good progress on nutrition today but on the question of support to agriculture the response has been disappointing with a missed opportunity to invest significantly in the small farmers who feed a third of the world’s population.

“We believe that the expansion of the New Alliance is not the answer to decades of declining aid to agriculture. What was needed was a clear investment plan to support those small-holder farmers and producers to step up by improving their bargaining power, enabling them to have better and fairer participation in markets and prioritising their voices in the crucial decisions which affect their businesses and future.
 

"The Big IF Rally and Nutrition for Growth Event is just the start. The big issues of transparency, tax and land must now be tackled by the G8 leaders if the root causes of hunger are to have a chance of being eradicated. We must keep the pressure on over the next 10 days in the build-up to the G8." 

Find out more about what's happening in the build-up to the G8 meeting on June 17-18 >>