U.S. Rejects "Right to Food" Concept at Global Summit

by Hilmi Toros

"On several occasions we were at the breaking point," Aidan O'Driscoll, the Irish chairman of the group that drafted the declaration, told IPS.

Eighty hours of haggling over the past few days had not produced a document until the eve of the summit, which began June 10. The developing world pressed for a more forceful document; the U.S. delegation said the document had gone too far.

Agreement on the Declaration -- which is bereft of any new targets or commitments -- was finally saved by the Irish mediator who told delegates to "take it or leave it."

To begin with, governments could not agree on a title. The U.S. opposed the title "International Alliance Against Hunger" on the ground that it would risk creating new structures or demand new funding. Developing countries who backed this title managed to prevail.

Later, delegates almost gave up trying to reach agreement over the "right to food." Developing countries rallied together to insert a clause "reaffirming the right of everyone to have access to safe and nutritious food."

This represents no movement from the declaration at the first summit in Rome six years ago which spoke of "the right of everyone to have access to safe sand nutritious food, consistent with the right to adequate food and the fundamental right of everyone to be free from hunger."

The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) which is hosting the summit says this agreement does not require the State to feed its people, but only that "the State must respect and protect the right of individuals to feed themselves."

The U.S. government feared that a firm and formal "right to food" could expose governments to a legal challenge from their hungry.

A proposed "voluntary code of conduct on the right to food" in the original draft became less categorical in the declaration. The new language asks the FAO and its stakeholders to develop within two years "voluntary guidelines to support member states' efforts to achieve the progressive realization of the right to adequate food."

The document was finally approved last night to the relief, if not satisfaction, of the negotiators. The agreement lets governments express reservations over what they have approved.

"The United States lodges reservations," chief U.S. delegate Mary Chambliss declared without elaborating. It is uncertain how many other delegations will file reservations.

The U.S. is unhappy with the slow evolution of the "right to food" that has taken place, analysts say. It opposes new provisions that could make this right more formal, if not binding.

The U.S. view was backed during negotiations mainly by Canada, Australia and New Zealand. The European Union was led by its Spanish presidency to take a sympathetic view on development issues. Host country Italy was equally concerned about development.

At the last stages of the adoption of the report last night, the Canadian delegation made an effort to drop the reference to the right to adequate food, saying it was already included as a human right. Canada withdrew its proposal in the face of stiff opposition.

The right to food is now "much better defined," Mary Robinson, the outgoing UN High Commissioner on Human Rights, said in a report presented to the summit. "Unfortunately, however, insufficient steps towards implementation have been taken at the national and international levels, and the right to food is therefore far from being realized by all."

Robinson said: "The World Food Summit should give a fresh impetus to international action and enable the international community to agree to new steps to implement the right to adequate food." This summit, at least in its only declaration, will not.

The non-governmental organization Greenpeace criticized the declaration, saying it showed little of the political will needed to fight hunger and to achieve the goals of the first food summit.

"The draft proposal for a final declaration is clearly a step back from the 1996 agreement and not forward as it should be," said Emiliano Ezcurra of Greenpeace Argentina.

"Delegates gave in to pressure from the United States," he said. The call merely for voluntary guidelines to support nations' efforts to achieve food security was a "trade-off," he said.

"If freedom from hunger is the first freedom for humans, as the Italian head of state put it in the opening ceremony, then delegates should stop playing games and turn their ears to the malnourished instead of food dictators," said Miges Baumann from Greenpeace International in Rome.