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World Bank: Silent Famine - Pakistan, India, Afghanistan
By Maverick Pakistanis | April 27, 2008
The World Food Program’s map of Asia
From Maverick Pakistanis:ISLAMABAD, April 25 (Internews): The World Bank (WB) has warned about ‘silent famine’ hitting millions of poor in habitants of Pakistan, India, Afghanistan and others South Asian states owing to skyrocketing food prices, saying that only way out from the existing severe crisis will be enhancing regional cooperation by lifting trade restrictions on commodities.
“There is no time to waste as silent famine is hitting South Asian countries in the wake of higher food prices. There is a need to in crease regional cooperation by lifting ban on exports of wheat and rice which will benefit to poor farmers,” World Bank’s economist, Ijaz Ghani, said on video conference On “Food Prices-A Global Prospective and the Impact on South Asia.
The World Bank has recommended the regional states to de vise food security through existing safety nets to protect the poor, lower import tariffs and enhance regional cooperation to mitigate the challenges in the wake of higher food prices. The WB arranged video conferencing, which was connected from Washington, Islamabad, Kabul, Dhaka, New Delhi and Sri Lanka.
Ghani said that India has imposed ban on export of rice while Pakistan did the same related to wheat export. The WB’s expert on safety nets Mansoora Rashid said the Bank was recommending South Asian states to devise effective cash transfers programme to improve social safety nets.
”The social safety nets cannot protect every poor because there is large number of population live below the poverty line in this region,” she said and added the de livery and design of safety programmes needed substantial improvements to get the desired results.
Ghani said that the social safety nets would have certainly fiscal cost and it could not be sup ported at the cost of macroeconomic instability. “We cannot sup port general subsidies as it basically benefits rich people,” he added.
He said the bio fuel production is also causing pressure on prices of commodities. He criticised the United States and European Union for imposing trade restrictions on bio fuel, saying that it was creating distortion in the commodities prices.
Earlier, Hans Timer in his presentation on topic of global prospective of food prices said that the slow down in the US economy and improved growth achieved by the developing countries resulted into growing pres sure on food prices. The weakening dollar also caused pressure on food prices, he added.
Afghanistan’s finance minister said that the stability in Pakistan and Afghanistan played a vital role for meeting the requirements of food shortages in his country.
©Maverick Pakistanis
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April 27th, 2008 at 2:13 am
Nice writing style. I will come back to read more posts from you.
Susan Kishner
April 27th, 2008 at 11:51 pm
Thanks. You are most welcome to read more articles on current issues as well as profiles of Pakitani politicians at my website.
April 28th, 2008 at 12:31 am
Hi Susan,
Just to explain. Ghulam Hussain has his own web site “maverickpakistanis.com”. We contribute articles to each others site. He is a journalist on the ground in Pakistan and he is very much “on the pulse” of what is going on in the region. It’s a great website and he is indeed a great writer.
Ed