Articles examine food, water security issues

The following articles examining food and water security were published on Thursday. The U.N. News Centre writes, "The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) have called on the private sector to invest massively in agriculture, stressing that this is vital to winning the fight against hunger." The news service adds, "Speaking at a high-level conference in Istanbul focused on promoting private agricultural investment and trade from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean, [FAO Director-General Jose Graziano da Silva] said that apart from important investments, financial and in-kind contributions, the private sector can make another important valuable contribution, namely political support to food security" (9/13).

Inter Press Service reports, "Growing water shortages in many countries are a major threat to global security and development and should be a top priority at the U.N. Security Council, a panel of experts said in" a report (.pdf) released this week. "However, that report ignores the biggest threat to water security: neoliberal policies of the free market economic system laying waste to the natural world and turning water into a commodity, activists counter," the news service adds (Leahy, 9/13). In a post in the Guardian's "Sustainable Business" blog, freelance writer Tim Smedley summarizes a live discussion by an expert panel assembled by the newspaper that "explored the latest thinking to come out of World Water Week and asked 'where to next?' for addressing water and food security" (9/13).