wfn.org | World Food Summit Follow-up

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"UNITED METHODIST DAILY NEWS 97" by SUSAN PEEK on April 15, 1997 at 14:24
Eastern, about DAILY NEWS RELEASES FROM UNITED METHODIST NEWS SERVICE (118
notes).

Note 118 by UMNS on May 27, 1997 at 15:58 Eastern (4976 characters).

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Contact:  Joretta Purdue                    306(10-23-24-71B){118}
          Washington, D.C.  (202) 546-8722            May 23, 1997

United Methodist participants help
plan U.S. follow-up of World Food Summit

     WASHINGTON (UMNS) -- Food as "a right" continues to be a
contentious issue at the U.S. sessions relating to the World Food
Summit, according to two United Methodists who participated in
initial follow-up of the November meeting.
     A telecast originating here May 21 kicked off discussions at
16 sites from Providence, R.I., to Hilo, Hawaii.
     Invitations to the day-long consultations aimed at developing
a U.S. action plan on food security came from the Secretary of
Agriculture Dan Glickman, who addressed the hundreds of
participants via the telecast.
     Food security encompasses having sufficient adequate quality
and quantity of food plus access to it. It also includes
protecting the livelihood of small producers and the health and
safety of farm workers, explained Mark Harrison, a program
director with the United Methodist Board of Church and Society.
     "The most exciting thing was that the United States had
called people together to put together an action plan around a
United Nations action plan," he said about the daylong event.
     Harrison was at the main site, an auditorium at the U.S.
Department of Agriculture, where he said frequent reference was
made to the United States' having all this food available but
still having 4 million hungry people.
     And, he added, the issue of food as a right was raised by
many participants including Cheryl Morden, a staff member of
Church World Service/Lutheran World Relief, who was part of the
international panel on the telecast. Church World Service is the
international relief arm of the National Council of Churches.
     Harrison explained that the objection by the United States to
the idea that freedom from hunger is a basic right had been a
major point at which the U.S. delegation diverged from other
nations at the World Food Summit in Rome in November 1996.
     Denise O'Brien -- United Methodist laywoman, farmer and
activist from near Atlantic, Iowa -- said food as a right was the
foremost priority with the 60-70 people gathered at the Ames,
Iowa, site, where she was part of a panel on international food
issues.
     As part of that panel, O'Brien said she reiterated Modren's
points, including the importance of women's participation in food
security decisions. That concern ended up being fourth on the list
of priorities coming out of Iowa, she said.
     The Midwesterners also talked about the need of farmers "to
make a profit in agriculture in order to stay in agriculture" and
the need to build up food reserves against international
disasters.
     The Washington site also talked about food reserves and noted
that the U.S. reserves are very low now, Harrison said.
     He said he urged the group to include in the action plan some
provision for appropriateness of technological aid being supplied
to developing countries. He used the example of African farmers'
receiving tractors when the size of their farms dictated the use
of hand tillers.
     Discussion favored empowering people to produce food and
touched on the importance of improving transportation in
developing countries to serve the internal markets, not just the
external ones, Harrison reported.
     In the United States where infrastructure is not such a
problem, some areas -- especially in rural or inner city locations
-- do not have clean and sufficient grocery stores, he said,
commenting that as an access issue such concerns are part of food
security.
     Regarding the international scene, Harrison noted, the
consultation warned against reducing food security as a result of
structural adjustment programs required of debt-ridden countries
by the International Monetary Fund or the World Bank.
     He said concern was voiced about the effects in the United
States of its farm bill, which is in the process of phasing out
price supports for farm commodities, and the welfare reform
legislation, which has reduced funding for food stamps and other
nutritional programs as well as wiping out benefits that allowed
hundreds of thousands of individuals to purchase food and housing.
     Harrison added that the group expressed a need for people to
understand how some measures involved in balancing the budget will
affect food programs.
     The next step in the consultative process involves
representatives from each site coming to Washington June 5 to
merge the reports from the 16 sites. O'Brien is slated to be one
of the reporters. Throughout the summer a joint government/non-
government writing team is to draft a policy document.
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