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G8 must give more or 20% of the world population may die

By Bridget Freer on Monday 6 July 2009

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Poverty - World News - Marie Claire

The world's eight richest nations must spend billions more on food aid or one in six of the world's population may starve to death, warns the charity ActionAid.

'Unless world leaders step up their response, the global food crisis is likely to worsen over the next few years,' a report by the charity, whose mission is to end world poverty, warned.

The G8 countries should sign up to a 'new global compact to end hunger' to save a billion people from malnutrition.

'On current trends, 20% of the world's population will be chronically malnourished within two years.'

In 2000, the UN vowed to halve hunger by 2015 as part of its Millennium Development Goals.
But the number of people suffering from chronic hunger has continued to rise and this year is expected to pass the 1 billion mark – one sixth of the global population.

This week's G8 summit in L'Aquila, Italy, warns ActionAid, is the last chance for them to do something about worsening starvation in the developing world. They say that the group should agree to increase farming aid by £14 billion a year by 2012.

To meet its share of this target, Britain will have to treble its spend on agricultural aid from £365million to £1.1billion.

The ActionAid report – Let Them Eat Promises: How the G8 Are Failing The Billion Hungry – also claims only half of the £6.1billion of aid pledged at last year's G8 summit has been delivered.

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