Thursday, October 16, 2008

GEAG expresses concern over emerging food security crisis

Times of India, Gorakhpur
16 October, 2008
Gorakhpur Environmental Action group (GEAG), a voluntary organization working for sustainable agriculture, expressed great concern over the emerging food security crisis.
To make the common people aware about this problem, the food and agriculture organization(fao) of United Nations, which has its branches in 150 countries of the world, world organize several programmes on October16, the World Food Day with this year’s theme being “World Food Crisis: Climate change and bio-energy”.
GEAG President, S.A.Wajih said that presently there were 7.5 crore people in the world who could be categorized as ‘hungry persons’ but this number could multiply in days to come if prices of food items increased at the present rate. The food production in the world is worst affected by the climate change, he noted.
The scenario in India regarding food crisis is more alarming than that in the western world. About 50 percent of the hungry persons of the world reside in the India alone and 46 percent of children below the age of 3 years are suffering from malnutrition. The situation of Uttar Pradesh is more pathetic as it has the maximum number of children suffering with malnutrition, he said.
The agricultural production in India is largely dependent on climate besides the technical advancement in other fields of development. The UN has long urged India to give more importance to agricultural production and water management. Though growth of GDP in India was 8.5 percent in last financial year but agricultural growth rate was only 2.6 percent.
Immediate attention should be paid to increase the agricultural production, he said.

Jitendra Dwivedi
Media Coordinator
Gorakhpur Environmental Action Group

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