UN food agency wins Peace Nobel

THE United Nations food agency, the World Food Programme (WFP), won the Nobel Peace Prize yesterday for its efforts to combat hunger and improve conditions for peace in areas affected by conflict.

The WFP is “deeply humbled” by the announcement it had won this year’s Nobel Peace Prize, executive director David Beasley said yesterday.

The Rome-based organisation says it helps some 97 million people in about 88 countries each year, and that one in nine people worldwide still do not have enough to eat.

“The need for international solidarity and multilateral cooperation is more conspicuous than ever,” Berit Reiss-andersen, chairwoman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, told a news conference.

The WFP is a driving force in efforts to prevent the use of hunger as a weapon of war and conflict, and the Covid-19 pandemic, which theorganisation says could double hunger worldwide, has made it even more relevant, she said.

“The coronavirus pandemic has contributed to a strong upsurge in the number of victims of hunger in the world,” the Nobel committee said in its citation. “Until the day we have a medical vaccine, food is the best vaccine against chaos ...

“There is an estimate within the World Food Programme that... there will be 265 million starving people within a year, so of course this is also a call to the international community not to underfund the World Food Programme.” | Reuters