No Time to Lose in Eradicating Hunger and Malnutrition

There is still time to work on the commitment to eliminate hunger, but urgent measures are necessary to reverse the recent increase in the reported number of hungry people. This was the united call of the speakers at the Committee on World Food Security (CFS) happening this week in Rome, Italy. CFS is the foremost inclusive international and intergovernmental platform for policy coherence and convergence on food security and nutrition.

"There's no time to lose," said José Graziano da Silva, Director-General of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, during the opening of the CFS meeting. Failure to eradicate hunger will undermine all the Sustainable Development Goals, meaning "poverty will not be eradicated, natural resources will continue to degrade, and forced migration will continue to rise," he added.

This year's meeting was focused on improving food systems and nutrition, Right to Food guidelines, as well as other side events covering other issues, including climate change, urbanization, food processing, and livestock management.

"Our agenda is extremely ambitious. If we are victorious, if every person in every country is sustainably food secure in 2030, that will be the most consequential turning point in history," said CFS Chair Mario Arvelo. "We can offer solutions for lifting this shadow that is eclipsing the human condition," he stressed.

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