UN warns Vietnam of food insecurity

By VNA

April 26, 2009

VietNamNet Bridge - The United Nations was quoted by Malaysian news agency (Bernama) as reporting that Vietnam was among the eight Southeast Asian nations in the danger of food insecurity.

The report released by the international body on April 24 also named Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, the Philippines, Indonesia, Myanmar and the Democratic Republic of Timor Leste.

Dr. Noeleen Heyzer, Secretary of the UN Economic and Social Committee in the Asian-Pacific region, where a total of 26 countries are included in the warning list, said despite high economic growth rates, the region accounts for 62 percent of the world’s famine-affected population.

The hotbed countries have a total population of 2.2 billion, making up 53.8 percent of the world population.Heyzer said the global economic crisis would not be contained if efforts to solve food crisis fail. She emphasised that the food crisis in the region have even turned into food crisis.

The UN expert raised worries that food prices remained high as the economic downturn has driven an increasing number of people into unemployment and low incomes.The UN April 24 report has rung an alarm to the world against a fact that food crisis pose a real risk along with the current economic crisis, said Heyzer.

Experts are worried over a relapse of a pressure on food price hike once the global economy rebounds. They also warned that protectionism policies would lead to a surge in food prices, causing a reverse impact on food security in Asia-Pacific as most of regional countries have to import food to meet domestic demand.