The cost of hunger and a summit failure

A new ActionAid report has revealed that hunger could be costing poor nations $450bn a year - more than ten times the amount needed to halve hunger by 2015 and meet Millennium Development Goal One. The report, Who’s really fighting hunger? shows the real dates countries will meet MDG1 and scores nations on their efforts to fight hunger. Is was released to coincide with world leaders meeting at the UN in New York to discuss progress on the Millennium Development Goals.

As the UN Millennium Development Goals summit closes in New York, ActionAid’s Chief Executive Joanna Kerr says: “With the world still reeling from a global food crisis and the threat of another looming, world leaders should have initiated an emergency response here at the summit. Instead for yet another year nearly a billion people will go to bed hungry and the world will be $450 billion poorer.”

According to ActionAid, UN summits will continue failing to deliver so long as leaders keep making empty promises on too many issues. With only five years to go, concerted action on the goals most off track is the only way forward. “Spreading yourself too thin never gets the job done.”