Mr. Chairman, Honourable ministers,
Mr. Executive Secretary,
Distinguished delegates and observers.
Ladies and gentlemen,
It is an honour and a distinct pleasure for me to deliver this statement on behalf of Dr. Edouard Saouma, Director-General of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, on the occasion of the Silver Jubilee of the United Nations Economic Com mission for Africa at the eighteenth session and ninth meeting of the Conference of Minis
ters of the Commission.On behalf of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, I am happy
to join numerous well-wishers in congratulating the United Nations Economic Commission
for Africa on its Silver Jubilee.In doing so, we salute a sister organization with which we have enjoyed 25 years of fruitful co-operation, notably through the joint ECA/FAO Agriculture Division.
Among the most recent and noteworthy examples of this productive working relation ship is FAO's co-operation in preparing the Regional Food Plan for Africa and the agricul tural component of the Lagos Plan of Action.
Mr. Chairman, FAO is particularly happy to note from tjie agenda of your current meeting, the documentation prepared for it, and from various other indicators, that even as it marks its Silver Jubilee, ECA is fully*iindful of the crises of our time and Africa's dis proportionate share of them. In no other sector of the African economy, Mr. Chairman, has development been so problematic as in food and agriculture.
Africa's food crisis indeed constitutes one of the greatest development challenges in the world today. Per caput food production has dropped by more than 10 per cent in the past ten years, and average dietary energy supplies have been barely maintained at 6 to 7 per cent below nutritional requirements. Food imports have more than doubled in volume and have risen five times in cost. The decline has been particularly serious in the least developed African countries which represent two thirds of the world's poorest countries. At present, 25 to 30 per cent of their population experience hunger and are malnourished during the greater part of the year. These privations are aggravated by very low domestic food production and inadequate distribution networks.
In the past two years, many countries of the Sahel and in eastern and southern Africa have experienced abnormal food shortages. In eastern Africa, the situation has been made even more difficult by an influx of refugees and displaced persons. Famine is a bitter reality in many African countries.
In this sombre context, FAO, as the lead agency for food, agricultural and rural development within the United Nations system, is confident that the review of socio-economic development in Africa from 1958 to 1983, which is an item on your agenda, Mr.
Chairman, as the first Silver Jubilee event will assist once more in focusing minds at this meeting and beyond it on the urgency of decisive action by Africa and its" development partners to contain and improve the continent's food and agricultural situation.
FAO, therefore, takes this opportunity to renew its tribute to the foresight shown by the OAU Heads of State and Government in adopting the Lagos Plan of Action for the im plementation of the Monrovia Strategy for the economic development of Africa. It will be recalled, Mr. Chairman, that in that Plan, the OAU Heads of State and Government agreed inter alia that:
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"For an improvement of the food situation in Africa, the fundamental requisite is a strong political will to channel a greatly increased volume of resources to agriculture, to carry through essential reorientations of social systems, to apply policies that will induce small farmers and members of agricultural co-operatives to achieve higher levels of productivity, and to set up effective machineries for the formulation of relevant programmes and for their execution."
Mr. Chairman, neither FAO nor any other international or regional development agency can substitute itself for African Governments as the main force for the implementation of the Lagos Plan of Action. But we can all assist in this, as we are, indeed, explicitly invited to do by the OAU Heads of State and Government.
Mr. Chairman, you can rest assured that the challenge posed by this invitation is one that FAO welcomes. For it is no secret that Africa has pride of place in the organization's priorities. In the current biennium, some 35 per cent of the regular programme is devoted to Africa. Africa, in each biennium, has received over one third of the resources of our technical co-operation programme. Twenty-nine of the 68 FAO representative offices are in Africa. And Africa's share of the Special Action Programmes' resources has ranged from over one third to four fifths in the past six years.
For the next programme of work and budget (1984-85) which will be discussed in our governing bodies during the coming months, I propose an even stronger emphasis on African development issues, with special attention devoted to training and to problems of food security and related policies. I can also point, Mr. Chairman, to the fact that FAO is currently executing field projects of various kinds in Africa. The total cost of these projects stands today at more than $US 460 million, and FAO continues actively, and often success fully, to assist African Governments and intergovernmental organizations in mobilizing for agricultural and rural development external resources from the United Nations system, donor governments and non-governmental organizations.
It is a pleasure for me to be able to declare before you, Mr. Chairman, that since April 1980, FAO's assistance programmes in Africa with African Governments and inter governmental organizations have been conceived, designed and implemented in furtherance of the objectives and guiding principles of the Lagos Plan of Action.
But we are aware of the fact that the tokens of FAO's commitment to Africa just cited do not come anywhere near the magnitude of financial resources needed to deliver FAO's not inconsiderable technical resources to the region as a contribution to its agricultural development. However, we have no doubt, Mr. Chairman, that your review of socio-economic development in Africa during the past 25 years and, indeed, the planned Silver Jubilee commemoration declaration will accord the food and agriculture sector the attention it deserves and assist FAO in its continuing efforts to mobilize even more resources for African agricultural development.
I thank you for your attention, Mr. Chairman.