Seminar tackles food security

MANILA, Philippines - Is the world capable of feeding seven billion people without stunting growth and harming the environment? This is one of the pressing issues up for discussion at forums on the sidelines of the Asian Development Bank’s 45th Board of Governors Annual Meeting taking place this week.

The seminar, “Seven Billion and Growing: How Will the World Feed Itself,” seeks to assess the global food supply as well as the economic and social impact of rising food prices. It will also tackle the role of policy in addressing the challenges to food security.

The discussion is part of the series of seminars for the ADB meet being hosted by the Philippines. It comes as the Southeast Asian nation makes progress in taming inflation while ensuring sustainable growth.

The seminar will take off from a recent ADB study which estimates that a 30-percent increase in food prices can reduce gross domestic product (GDP) growth in some of the food importing countries by as much as 0.6 percentage points. And if the rise in food prices is also accompanied by a 30- percent hike in fuel prices, the projected decline in GDP expansion rates could be as high as 1.5 percentage points.

The ADB study also said that high food prices also erode the purchasing power of households and undermine recent gains in poverty reduction with an estimate of a 1.9 percentage point increase in poverty incidence for every 10 percent increase in domestic food prices in developing Asia, which is home to 3.3 billion people. Such a situation is equivalent to pushing 64.4 million more people into poverty.

The seminar speakers include experts from the ADB, Canadian International Development Agency, AgenceFrancaise de Developpement, and International Food Policy Research Institute.

The other seminars set for today deal with development three years after the financial crisis, the effect of Europe’s sovereign debt crisis on Asia Pacific banks, and the challenges ahead for regional cooperation. The seminars are taking place at the Philippine International Convention Center, the main venue of the ADB annual meeting.