Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2009-11-25-Speech-3-436"
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"en.20091125.27.3-436"2
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"In the ten years or so that I have been a member of the European Parliament, I have regularly heard fine words being used in this House. In the run-up to the World Food Summit in Rome, Mr Barroso, President of the Commission, also used fine words. He said: ‘We have collectively failed in the fight against famine. That is a moral scandal and a huge stain on our collective conscience.’ End of quote. And he was absolutely right. Which makes the outcome of the summit all the more disappointing. I have a sneaking feeling that what took centre stage in Rome was the political interests of the wealthy countries, rather than the interests of the one billion hungry people in the world. To give you a concrete illustration, I will use two examples: as is increasingly being recognised, the biofuel policy and its promotion are causing price increases and, thus, more famine. However, it seems to be taboo to express any criticism of this policy.
Also, I have, on many previous occasions, already drawn this House’s attention to the danger of encouraging third countries to make large investments in Africa, with a view to ensuring their own food security, for example. How can countries where millions of people are dependent on UN food aid be expected to export to third countries? Yet, there is no mention of this in the final declaration.
It is very easy for wealthy countries to deal with controversial topics by simply making well-intentioned, impassioned pleas and commissioning further studies. Another thing I take from the declaration is that developing countries will have to rely primarily on their own resources. In the light of the international community’s failure so far to eradicate hunger, I would call this nothing short of shameful.
Apart from that, I have also spent some time going through the final declarations of previous world food summits and come to the conclusion that they share a surprising number of similarities – with each other and with the resolution of this Parliament, for that matter. They all talk of urgency and invariably call for the implementation of promises made in the past. However, should not the repetition of all those calls be a warning signal to us? To quote Mr De Schutte, the UN rapporteur, ‘poor people do not need promises’. As has often been said before, food security ought to be a human right. Madam President, I wish to approach this from a different angle and say that the Bible teaches us that it is one of God’s commandments that we should feed the hungry. That is my personal duty and our collective responsibility."@en1
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