Our global food system is broken by Oxfam International 2:16pm 6th Sep, 2011   September 22, 2011    Oxfam Warns of spiralling Land Grab in Developing Countries, by John Vidal.    Many of world"s poorest "being left worse off by unprecedented land deals", despite claims by governments and speculators.    The scale of the rush by speculators, pension funds and global agri-businesses to acquire large areas of developing countries is far greater than previously thought, and is already leading to conflict, hunger and human rights abuses, says Oxfam.    The international development agency has identified 227m ha (561m acre ha) of land – an area the size of north-west Europe – as having being reportedly sold, leased or licensed, largely in Africa and mostly to international investors in thousands of secretive deals since 2001. This compares with about 56m ha identified by the World Bank earlier this year, again predominantly in Africa.    The new land rush, which was triggered by food riots, a series of harvest failures following major droughts and the western investors moving out of the US property market in 2008, is being justified by governments and speculators in the name of growing food for hungry people and biofuels for environmental benefit.    But, says Oxfam, "many of the deals are in fact "land grabs" where the rights and needs of the people previously living on the land are ignored, leaving them homeless and without land to grow enough food to eat and make a living".    "Many of the world"s poorest people are being left worse off by the unprecedented pace of land deals and the frenetic competition for land. The blinkered scramble for land by investors is ignoring the people who live on the land and rely on it to survive," said Oxfam chief executive Dame Barbara Stocking.    Oxfam expects the land grabbing to increase as populations grow. The report said: "The huge increase in demand for food will need to be met by land resources that are under increasing pressure from climate change, water depletion, and other resource constraints, and squeezed by biofuel production, carbon sequestration and forest conservation, timber production, and non-food crops."    While some investors might claim to have experience in agricultural production, many may only be purchasing land speculatively, anticipating price increases in the coming years, a practice known as "land banking".    In addition, developing countries are under pressure from the IMF, the World Bank and other regional banks to put farmland on the international market to increase economic development and improve the balance of payments.    Much of the land grabbing has being driven by the expansion of sugar cane and oil palm for biofuel production. "Thousands of people have been persuaded to part with their land on the basis of false promises in Indonesia, or have been evicted from their lands and their homes in Uganda, Guatemala and Honduras," says the report.    Most of the land deals done in Ethiopia, Ghana, Mali, Mozambique Senegal, and Tanzania have been to grow crops for export commodities, including cut flowers as well as biofuels. In Mozambique, where approximately 35% of households are chronically food insecure, only 32,000 ha out of the 433,000 approved for land deals between 2007 and 2009 were for food crops.    The report said: "Unrestricted export clauses in contracts, together with small-scale food producers losing their key productive asset, may well worsen rather than improve food security. Moreover, investors short time scales may tempt them into unsustainable cultivation practices, undermining food production in the long-term.    Stocking called on the EU to scrap the incentive offered to investors to grow biofuel crops, and organisations like the World Bank to ensure that local people are consulted on land deals.    "Governments should avoid pandering to investors" wishes, and prioritise existing land use rights – not just where legal land title or formal ownership rights are held," said the report.    Stocking said: "Land investment has great potential to help people work themselves out of poverty, but the current rush for land is leaving people worse off. Global action is crucial if we are to protect local people from losing what little they have for the profits of a few, and build towards a tomorrow where everyone has enough."    Sep 2011    Our global food system is broken, by Angélique Kidjo, Oxfam Global Ambassador.    I know what it’s like to go without food. Hunger is no joke. It feels like there is a fire in your belly. I wouldn’t wish it on a single person. But close to 1 billion men, women and children – one in seven of us – are hungry today.    But there is no good reason why anyone should go hungry. The world can feed every single one of us. The problem is the way we grow and share food.    Our global food system is broken. It might not seem immediately obvious to everyone. The supermarket shelves in many countries are piled high with foods from around the globe and are well within the means of the average shopper. But take a closer look and it’s not hard to see the cracks in the system.    We live in a world where the number of hungry people is rising rather then falling for the first time in decades; where almost half of all food produced goes to waste; where rising food prices eat up over three quarters of poor people’s weekly income.    We live in a world where climate change and dwindling natural resources will make feeding our growing population harder still; where millions more men, women and children will feel the fire in their bellies.    Look again, through the eyes of one of the millions of poor food producers, and you will see where it’s all going wrong.    There are 500 million small farms in developing countries which together feed one third of humanity. These farmers get little or no support from their governments or the international community yet they are thrust into competition with a handful of wealthy farms in industrialized countries which receive billions of dollars worth of government subsidies.    These farmers face increasingly erratic and extreme weather brought about by climate change. Yet the governments with the power to stop climate change getting out of control, and the money to help them adapt, have delivered little in the way of concrete action to tackle the problem.    These farmers have seen their land, which their communities have relied on for generations, sold off to the local elites, foreign governments and big businesses.    While the women amongst them (and there are many) are often prevented from having ownership of the land they farm by local customs or national laws.    These farmers have struggled to cope with the rising price of food driven, in part, by the operations of biofuels companies whose governments reward them for turning food into fuel – even at times of major global food crisis.    These farmers know better than anyone that the system is broken. Oxfam, which has been working with poor producers for close to 70 years, is launching a new global campaign to fix it.    Oxfam’s GROW campaign wants to see governments kick start the transformation to a new global food system. One which will ensure every single person always has enough to eat.    This means governments investing in poor producers so they can feed more people and adapt to a changing climate; it means putting an end to food price crises by regulating commodity markets and reforming flawed biofuels policies; it means securing poor peoples’ right to land and water; and it means taking action to prevent catastrophic climate change from further undermining food production.    Grow is also calling on companies to change their business practices to ensure their profits don’t come at the expense of poor producers and poor consumers.    It would be naive to think all governments and companies will suddenly see the world through the eyes of those poor farmers. It’s up to us, as consumers and citizens, to open their eyes.    We must show them – by reducing our own carbon emissions, by buying fairly traded and sustainable produce and by joining Oxfam in demanding change – that hunger is not acceptable today or tomorrow. Visit the related web page
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