Last week, I traveled to Rome for the High-Level Conference on World Food Security, a response by the U.N. to craft a worldwide response to this hunger crisis. The size of the conference and the participation of so many heads of state impressed me. But it also reminded me that conferences and reports aren't enough to end a crisis. We must build the political will to overcome hunger.
You’re helping to do that by participating in the Recipe for Hope campaign. Thank you.
Recipe for Hope: Week 6
Ingredient for Despair: Restrictive and distorted trade policies
Another national government policy that can come between supply and demand is the prohibition of certain exports. Some grain-producing countries have done this recently in an effort to keep domestic prices under control. Thus, less grain is available globally while demand has risen. The result is dramatic increases in the price of corn, soybeans, wheat, oats, rice, and others.
In a recent series on the hunger crisis, the Washington Post reported that factors that interfere with supply and demand explain why "the global food trade never became the kind of well-honed machine" that has made the price of manufactured products increasingly similar worldwide. Some economists argue that if market forces played a larger role, food prices would have risen more gradually and the world would have had more time to adjust.
Read the Washington Post story.
Ingredients for Hope: Our Recipe for Hope has two components—something you can do; and something you can say to our nation’s leaders.
- Prayers for a Time of Hunger
In celebration of Father's Day this Sunday (June 15)—and to remember fathers around the world struggling to feed their families—include special prayers for hungry people in your worship services or when you say grace at home.
- Call Congress on Bread for the World's annual Lobby Day, June 17
Please call your member of Congress on June 17th and ask them to increase poverty focused development assistance by $5 billion in the fiscal year 2009 budget.
Talking points:
- In light of the recent hunger crisis, we must increase our commitment to programs that provide sustainable assistance to the world's poor.
- Poverty-focused development assistance is focused primarily on programs that reduce hunger, poverty and disease in the world's poorest countries.
- An additional $5 billion will help to ensure that the United States keeps the commitments we have made to world's most vulnerable people.
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Check our Recipe for Hope campaign headquarters for more information and ingredients from previous weeks.
David Beckmann
President
Bread for the World
