The Right to FoodUnited Nations

General Assembly Human Rights CouncilSixteenth session, 20 December 2010

Agenda item 3

Promotion and protection of all human rights, civil,political, economic, social and cultural rights,

including the right to development.Report submitted by the Special Rapporteur,

Olivier De Schutter

on the right to food.

Basics of the Right to Food• Increasing food production to meet future

needs, is not sufficient. • It will not allow significant progress in

combating hunger and malnutrition • if it is not combined with higher incomes and

improved livelihoods for the poorest

The Right to Food• This is particularly important to small-scale

farmers in developing countries.

The Right to Food• Short-term gains will not offset long-term losses of

productive ecosystems, threatening our ability to maintain current food production levels.

Food production in Developing Countries 1979 - 91

Change in total food production in developing countries, 1979-81 to 1989-91 Sources: FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations), 1991

Change in per capita food production, 1979-81 to 1989-91

The Right to Food• We have the ability to greatly improve

agricultural production in many poor, food-deficit countries.

• While at the same time improving the livelihoods of smallholder farmers and preserving ecosystems.

The Right to Food• It would contribute to rural

development and preserve the ability for future generations to meet their needs.

• It would also contribute to the growth of other parts of the economy by creating demand for non-agricultural products with new, higher incomes in rural areas.

Ensuring the right to food requires• …the possibility either to feed oneself

directly from productive lands and waters, or to buy food.

• This implies ensuring that food is available, accessible and adequate.

People wait for food at a UN distribution center in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, 2008

Accessibility requires physical + economic access

• Physical accessibility means that food is accessible to all people, including the physically vulnerable such as children, older persons or the disabiled;

• Economic accessibility means that food must be affordable without compromising other basic needs such as education fees, medical care or housing.

Adequacy requires• Adequacy requires that food satisfy dietary

needs (factoring a person’s age, living conditions, health, occupation, sex, etc), be safe for human consumption, free of adverse substances and culturally acceptable.

Community Partners• Participation must include of food-

insecure groups in the design and implementation of all food policies.

• This is a key dimension of the right to food, and really all initiatives from the outside world, for policies to be successful.

Food systems should be developed in order to meet the following three objectives:

• First, food systems must ensure the availability of food for everyone.

• Estimates call for a 70% increase in food production by 2050, assuming population growth, and changes in the food types and amounts eaten found with increased urbanization and higher incomes.

Meat Eaten / person

Meat Production• At present, nearly half of the world’s cereal

production is used to produce animal feed, and• meat consumption is predicted to increase from

37.4 kg/person/year in 2000 to over 52 kg/person/year by 2050, so that by mid-century, 50 per cent of total cereal production may go to increasing meat production.

World Meat Production USA

Grain needed to make 1 kg meat

Reallocation of grains• Therefore, reallocating cereals used in animal feed

to human consumption, a highly desirable option in developed countries where the excess animal protein consumption is a source of public health problems…

• (UNEP) estimates that the loss of calories from feeding cereals to animals instead of using cereals directly as human food represents the annual calorie need for more than 3.5 billion people.

Food Losses• In addition, food losses in the field (between

planting and harvesting) may be as high as 20 to 40 per cent of the potential harvest in developing countries due to pests and pathogens,

• Average post-harvest losses, from poor storage and conservation, amount at least to 12 per cent, and up to 50 per cent for fruits and vegetables.

Agrofuels• Finally, as a result of policies to promote the

production and use of agrofuels, the diversion of crops from meeting food needs to meeting energy needs contributes to tightening the pressure on agricultural supplies.Exploring links between EU agricultural

policy and world poverty

Exploring links between agricultural policy and world poverty

• Recent dramatic increases in food prices are having severe consequences for poor countries and poor people.

• The FAO reports that food prices rose by nearly 40 percent in 2007 and made further large jumps in early 2008.

• Nearly all agricultural commodities—including rice, maize, wheat, meat, dairy products, soybeans, palm oil, and cassava—are affected.

Food Riots Lead to Increased Push for Food Security

• In response to the price hikes, food riots have occurred in many developing countries, including Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Egypt, Haiti, Indonesia, Senegal, and Somalia. According to the FAO, 37 countries are now facing food crises.

Second, agriculture must develop in ways that increase the incomes of smallholders.

• Food availability is, first and foremost, an issue at the household level,

• Hunger today is not because stocks are too low or to global supplies unable to meet demand, but to poverty;

• increasing the incomes of the poorest is the best way to combat it.

There is not a shortage of foods.

Economic growth originating in agriculture is at leasttwice as effective in reducing poverty as GDP growth

originating outside agriculture.

• Multiplier effects are significantly higher when growth is triggered by higher incomes for smallholders, stimulating demand for goods and services from local sellers and service providers.

Large agrobusinesses• When large estates increase their revenue, most is

spent on imported inputs and machinery, and much less trickles down to local traders.

• Only by supporting small producers can we help break the vicious cycle that leads from rural poverty to the expansion of urban slums, in which poverty breeds more poverty.

Third, agriculture must not compromise its ability to satisfy future needs.

• The loss of biodiversity, unsustainable use of water, and pollution of soils and water are issues which reduce the continuing ability for natural resources to support agriculture.

Climate change• Climate change, which translates in more frequent

and extreme weather events, such as droughts and floods and less predictable rainfall, is already having a severe impact on the ability of certain regions and communities to feed themselves.

It is also destabilizing markets.• The rise in sea level is already causing the

salinization of water in certain coastal areas, making water sources improper for irrigation purposes.

• The change in average temperatures is threatening the ability of entire regions, particularly those living from rain-fed agriculture, to maintain actual levels of agricultural production.

Day # of RecordsFri. Mar. 9 101

Sat. Mar. 10 105Sun. Mar. 11 189Mon. Mar. 12 138Tue. Mar. 13 218

Wed. Mar. 14 460Thu. Mar. 15 662Fri. Mar. 16 496Sat. Mar. 17 565Sun. Mar. 18 586Mon. Mar. 19 510Tue. Mar. 20 710Wed. Mar. 21 575Thu. Mar. 22 295

March has meant 6,000 weather records brokenBy Chris Dolce, Jonathan Erdman, Nick Wiltgen, weather.comWe've seen an amazing, historic run of record warmth in March 2012. First, consider the sheer number of daily record highs either tied or broken over the past two weeks. The counts in the table below are courtesy of the National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) since Mar. 9. Counts from Mar. 23 are still being tabulated and will be posted later.

Africa• By 2080, 600 million additional people could be at

risk of hunger, as a direct result of climate change.• In Sub-Saharan Africa, arid and semi-arid areas are

projected to increase by 60 - 90 million hectares• In Southern Africa, yields from rain-fed agriculture

could be reduced by up to 50 % by 2020.

• Most past efforts focused on improving seeds and providing farmers chemicals + fertilizers to increase yields, replicating industrial models of external inputs to produce outputs in a linear model of production.

Agroecology seeks to improve the sustainability of agroecosystems

•Instead, agroecology seeks to improve the sustainability of agroecosystems by mimicking nature instead of industry.

•Scaling up agroecological practices can simultaneously increase farm productivity and food security, improve incomes and rural livelihoods, and reverse the trend towards species loss and genetic erosion.