{"id":252806,"date":"2020-04-21T21:26:45","date_gmt":"2020-04-22T01:26:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=252806"},"modified":"2020-04-21T21:26:45","modified_gmt":"2020-04-22T01:26:45","slug":"world-must-act-now-to-avert-food-crisis-over-virus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2020\/04\/21\/world-must-act-now-to-avert-food-crisis-over-virus\/","title":{"rendered":"World must act now to avert food crisis over virus"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
“The fallout from Covid-19 may push rural families even deeper into poverty, hunger and desperation, which is a real threat to global prosperity and stability,” Gilbert Houngbo noted. (Shutterstock photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\n
\n

ISTANBUL<\/strong>\u00a0\u2013 Countries should act now to stop the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) pandemic transforming into a food crisis, the head of the UN International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) said on Monday.<\/p>\n

“The fallout from Covid-19 may push rural families even deeper into poverty, hunger and desperation, which is a real threat to global prosperity and stability,” Gilbert Houngbo noted.<\/p>\n

He asserted that immediate action can support rural people to provide rapid recovery and prevent a bigger humanitarian crisis.<\/p>\n

The IFAD launched a USD40 million package to support farmers and rural communities, the fund said in a press release.<\/p>\n

It expects to raise this fund by USD200 million with contributions from member states, foundations and the private sector.<\/p>\n

“Many small-scale farmers are unable to access markets to sell products or to buy inputs, such as seeds or fertilizer,” it recalled, adding: “As entire production chains are disrupted and unemployment rises, the most vulnerable include daily laborers, small businesses and informal workers, who are very often women and young people.”<\/p>\n

It also reminded that 80 percent of the poorest people globally live in rural areas, and, even before the pandemic, over 820 million people were going hungry every day.<\/p>\n

“A recent United Nations University study warned that in a worst-case scenario, the economic impact of the pandemic could push a further half-billion people into poverty,” it stressed.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, experts say Turkey is a self-sufficient country in terms of food, especially agricultural production.<\/p>\n

Many major European countries, such as Italy, the Netherlands, and Spain, employ foreign people for agricultural production, but closing borders due to the pandemic will further hit these countries’ production.<\/p>\n

After originating in Wuhan, China last December, Covid-19 has spread to at least 185 countries and regions worldwide, with Europe and the US the worst-hit regions.<\/p>\n

There are over 2.48 million cases worldwide and more than 170,400 deaths. Almost 653,000 have recovered from the virus, according to data compiled by US-based Johns Hopkins University.\u00a0(Anadolu)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ISTANBUL\u00a0\u2013 Countries should act now to stop the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) pandemic transforming into a food crisis, the head of …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":13193,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-252806","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","category-news-w","mauthors-anadolu","mauthors-philippine-news-agency"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252806","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252806"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252806\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":252808,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252806\/revisions\/252808"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13193"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252806"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252806"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252806"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}