Multilateral efforts needed to avert global crisis: PM Lee
Zakir Hussain, Straits Times 31 May 08;
COUNTRIES need to work together to tackle the problem of rising food prices, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said yesterday.
The issue has 'serious security implications', and could spark wars and failed states.
If a serious problem is to be averted, countries must improve productivity in farming.
Agencies like the World Bank and Food and Agriculture Organisation should promote research to increase yields, and agricultural trade must be kept 'free and fair', he said.
'Only then will farmers everywhere have the right market signals and incentives to produce more food to meet increased demand.'
Mr Lee's remarks, made in a keynote speech at the annual Shangri-La Dialogue on security issues, come at a time when humanitarian officials and other experts warn that rising food prices could destabilise governments.
The issue is set to be discussed at sessions today and tomorrow.
Global food prices have risen by half over the past year.
Mr Lee specifically cautioned food-producing countries against pursuing greater self-sufficiency and trying to keep food production within their own borders.
Such actions 'will cause greater international tensions', he said, as they will make prices more unstable.
'Food importers will scramble to secure their own needs and poor countries will suffer, not just greater privation but famine and starvation.'
Human ingenuity had deferred mathematician Thomas Malthus' forecast 200 years ago that population growth would outpace food production, but such a scenario could happen in the future, he said.
The world's population is steadily growing and hundreds of millions of Asians are becoming more affluent and consuming more and better food, 'crowding out billions who are still poor', Mr Lee noted.
And where food supply is concerned, 'misconceived green policies to subsidise biofuels are encouraging farmers to grow fuel instead of food'.
Climate change - a security threat Mr Lee highlighted at last year's dialogue - will also see more extreme weather, reducing the supply of fresh water and fertile land, he added.
And while better harvests may moderate prices next year, he felt tighter supplies and higher prices will be a long-term reality.
Poor countries will be hardest hit by food shortages, and hunger and famine could lead to social upheaval and strife.
'We are already experiencing a small foretaste of this today,' Mr Lee said, citing riots and unrest in several developing countries.
'In vulnerable areas like Darfur and Bangladesh, large numbers of people are moving across borders, often illegally, in search of food and water. Even without a food crisis, we have seen vicious xenophobic attacks in South Africa against immigrants fleeing unstable regimes and desperate poverty,' he said.
'In the event of a global food crisis, all this will play out on a much bigger scale across the globe.'
