On behalf of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP), the United Nations Asian and Pacific Centre for Agricultural Engineering and Machinery (UNAPCAEM) successfully hosted the subregional launch of UNESCAP’s Theme Study: Sustainable Agriculture and Food Security in Asia and the Pacific. The Launch held at the United Nations Compound in Beijing on 4 May 2009 featured Dr. Wang Maohua of China Agricultural University and Dr. Amitava Mukherjee, Head of UNAPCAEM as speakers in front of a group that included guests from China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Agriculture, State Administration of Grain (SAG), State Council Leading Group Office of Poverty Alleviation and Reduction, Chinese Academy of Engineering who is the key counterpart of UNAPCAEM, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Science, members of the media, the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) and the World Food Programme (WFP). A purpose of the launch was to jumpstart a call for immediate action in Asia and Pacific countries under the yoke of food insecurity, and discuss how to build resiliency to future crises, including sharing China’s experience as a country with limited natural resources, yet able to maintain a high level of food security.

The Sustainable Agriculture and Food Security in Asia and the Pacific has highlighted that while rapid economic growth has long defined the Asia and Pacific region, it continues to suffer a shocking number of undernourished and ill-fed persons. Currently, more than 60 percent of the world’s undernourished population lives in Asia and the Pacific. In 2005-2006, on average some 16 per cent of the region’s population, 542 million people, were going hungry – and in 2007, as a result of sudden price rises, that number is thought to have increased to 582 million –pre economic crisis figures. Thus the food security concerns currently sweeping the Asia-Pacific Region are not a sudden and unexpected crisis: signs have been around for some time now.

Quoting by Dr. Noeleen Heyzer, UN Under-Secretary-General and Executive Secretary of ESCAP, it was pointed out that “in East Asia and the Pacific, for example, rural children are twice as likely to be underweight as their peers in the cities”, with the report stating that “the number of children under five dying of malnutrition in our region is equivalent to 10 jumbo jets filled with children crashing every day and killing everyone on board.”

The above is partly because most governments have been neglecting agriculture, but also because many people cannot afford the food they need for an active and healthy life. “Today, the global financial crisis and the extraordinary collapse in job output and trade, has both affected people's economic and social access to food in many countries of this region," said Dr. Mukherjee. Many millions more are likely exposed to food insecurity that could have been spared had agriculture not have been overlooked in many countries in the Region.

Governments have stepped in, reacting to surges and food prices with measures such as restricting food exports, relaxing import tariffs on food imports to introducing special measures for social protection. Some of these responses are counter productive, but there are others which show greater promise, for strengthening food security both in the short and longer terms.

Citing examples of countries that are maintaining food security in the region, Dr. Wang in his presentation noted that “China feeds 22 percent of the world’s population on seven percent of the world’s arable land, and remains 95 percent self-sufficient in grain supply”. While China is able to maintain a very high level of food security, challenges lay ahead with potable water a huge issue and uneven access to food in western parts of the country. That noted, China has lessons for developing countries where policy makers set out to identify long term solutions, to their seemingly intractable problems of food insecurity and poverty.

Following the presentations a press conference was held with China Daily, Global Times, Xinhua News agency and other members of the media seeking answers to their questions. As example China Daily asked “what were the signs of the crisis?”  Fielding the question Dr. Mukherjee stated that “the impact speculation - while not a driver of commodity prices, can nevertheless accelerate and amplify price movements driven by fundamental supply and demand factors”. All of the aforementioned combined with the pre-crisis numbers of more than 60 percent of the world’s undernourished population in the region created the perfect storm.

It was also noted that by early 2009 with the onset of the global recession, prices fell back in real terms to around 2006 levels, and does not mean that the food crisis has melted away. The Study states that while forecasting future prices is difficult, once the industrial economies recover from the recession, both oil and food prices will probably start to rise again.

The Study calls for an agenda for food security addressing short-term threats to food security imposed by the global financial crisis by improving access to food; addressing medium-term threats via sustainable agriculture; and longer-term measures for adaptation to climate change.

In closing it was acknowledged that there are significant challenges to policy-makers, but that there are also regional instruments available to help take progressive and substantive steps in developing sustainable agriculture and food production policy as responses to the myriad of threats highlighted at the launch.