Humanitarian acts key to solve food crisis: Kuwait
NEW YORK: The key to solve the problems of hunger and lack of food security should go through acts based on morals and humanitarian efforts, said a senior Kuwaiti diplomat to the UNSC late Friday. During a UNSC session on hunger and conflicts, Kuwait’s Permanent Delegate to the UN Headquarters in New York, Ambassador Mansour Al-Otaibi said that the early UN warning system is part of the international organization’s efforts to tackle hunger caused by manmade conflicts and crises.
Carrying out to the letter the 17-item UN Sustainable Development Goals (UNSDGs) will hopefully lead to the eradication of most of the world’s problems by 2030, affirmed the Kuwaiti diplomat who noted that the very second goal of this ambitious plan was to end hunger, which is a feasible objective.
Ambassador Otaibi said that world countries should abide by rules and regulations that would hinder effects of conflicts, which are the main contributors to hunger around the globe. Reaching peace in any region of the world would gradually lower the effects of hunger by the passage of time, said the Ambassador, stressing that the international community should hasten efforts to implement all UN plans aimed at ending hunger. He went on saying that gathering provisions and capital for humanitarian action was another important aspect of attaining the UNSDGs. Despite the world’s sincere efforts, hunger and lack of food security still remains as one of the world’s most pressing issues, said Ambassador Otaibi who thanked the UN top Secretary General’s Assistants and officials for continuing to inform the global community on the current data concerning efforts against hunger. According to the World Food Programme and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) in their current 2018 reports, around 124 million people from 51 countries were affected by lack of food security in 2017, which is an increase by 11 million from the year before, said the Kuwaiti Ambassador.
He indicated that the data came a year after from the UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres letter on February 12, 2007 in regard to the alarming increase of hunger due to conflict. Most world countries took the initiative to respond to the UN Secretary General’s call for action including the State of Kuwait which donated $15 million to Somalia, South Sudan, Yemen, and the northeastern of Nigeria, Otaibi said.