733m Hungry Globally, Says Okonjo-Iweala

The Director-General, World Trade Organisation (WTO), Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has expressed concern over the Food and Agriculture Organisation( FAO)’s latest figures of 733 million people are facing hunger globally.

Speaking at the opening plenary of the World Food Forum in Rome, hosted by FAO, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala noted: “The FAO’s latest figures show around 733 million people are facing hunger — most of them in Africa and South Asia. At our current pace, we won’t meet Sustainable Development Goal to end hunger and malnutrition by 2030, as you heard earlier.

Climate change is a growing threat to food security, affecting every aspect of our food systems, and exacerbating the sector’s problems with water and land management, biodiversity loss, and deforestation. 55 per cent of the world’s food production occurs in areas experiencing water insecurity.”

She maintained that agricultural production and consumption have continued to be distorted by trade restrictions and subsidies. “In 54 countries analysed by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), support provided to individual producers averaged $630 billion per year [2] from 2020 to 2022. This support often has environmentally harmful effects, encouraging the overuse of fossil fuels, energy and water. The distance between business as usual, and truly sustainable food systems is considerable. The FAO has estimated that our current agri-food systems impose “hidden” health, environmental, and social costs equivalent to at least USD 10 trillion per year.”

She underscored the crucial role of trade and the WTO in addressing the challenges of farming and food security. “A free, fair, open, and predictable multilateral trading system and modernised trade rules [provided by the WTO], is critical to building an agrifood system that can deliver good food to the world’s people today and in the future,” she emphasised.

The Director-General recalled the strengthened partnership between the WTO and the FAO in the areas of food and agriculture. She highlighted the WTO’s ongoing efforts to update trade rules, stressing that the multilateral trading system must be complemented by domestic policies that reduce distortions and enhance competition. She pointed to the importance of “policies that provide essential public goods to farmers such as research, pest and disease control, efficient water management, and extension services that are needed to improve productivity and sustainability.”

In another development, she urged WTO members to “continue to be constructive” in addressing outstanding issues on the WTO work agenda such as agriculture, fisheries subsidies, development and dispute settlement reform so that concrete outcomes can be achieved. She spoke in her capacity as Chair of the Trade Negotiations Committee at a meeting of the WTO’s General Council.

“We need to continue to be constructive and to keep in our sights that we are here to achieve outcomes,” the Director-General told members, citing positive discussions on several issues under negotiation.

On agriculture, the Director-General said she was grateful for the positive discussion that took place at the Trade Negotiations Committee meeting on 10 October, which focused on advancing the agriculture negotiations.

On fisheries subsidies, the Director-General welcomed progress on acceptances of the Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies concluded in 2022 and noted that only 25 more acceptances are needed to ensure entry into force of the Agreement, with a number of additional acceptances expected in the days and weeks ahead.

She also underlined that members were “almost there” with regards to a deal on the second part of the Agreement, which aims to address subsidies contributing to overcapacity and overfishing. “There are some issues, not many, and some members who need more work to be done so that we can push towards a conclusion,” she said.

On development, the Director-General said she was happy that the work has resumed on special and differential treatment proposals at an October 11 meeting of the Committee on Trade and Development. To keep up the momentum and to work towards more concrete results, members should achieve as many results as possible in Geneva rather than waiting for the next Ministerial Conference, she told members.

On dispute settlement reform, the Director-General noted that reform of the system was a “collective desire of every member in this room,” the importance of which was underlined at recent meetings of the Group of 20 foreign ministers and the UN General Assembly meeting in New York.

On investment facilitation for development (IFD), Director-General noted the continued discussions on the proponents’ request to incorporate the IFD Agreement into the WTO framework.