Phil Hogan, former European Union trade commissioner, gestures while speaking during a trade committee debate in the Joseph Entreville building of the European Parliament in Brussels, Belgium, on Wednesday, February 19, 2020.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
SINGAPORE — Other countries will also have to fill the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization’s funding gap as the U.S. government withdraws, according to Phil Hogan, a former European Union commissioner who is currently running to head the world’s largest food agency.
“It’s important that we continue to support (the agency) financially…As the United States withdraws from some of these programs, other FAO member states will also have to step in to ensure that all animal disease issues and food safety issues are maintained,” Hogan told CNBC in an exclusive interview in Singapore on Wednesday.
The Trump administration has dismantled the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), once the world’s largest humanitarian donor, and drastically reduced U.S. foreign aid.
Mr Hogan, Ireland’s former EU agriculture and trade commissioner, is now the frontrunner to become director-general of the Rome-based body that oversees global rules for food security and warns of impending famine. He has been traveling to Asia for several weeks to meet with regional leaders ahead of a vote among member states next summer, when current leader Qu Dongyu’s term expires in July.
Chris Barrett, an agricultural and development economist at Cornell University, said United Nations agencies and virtually all international humanitarian NGOs and research institutions are struggling to raise funding, especially as donors, but not only the United States, have sharply cut foreign aid.
Barrett warned that a lack of funding would mean “less monitoring and monitoring to provide early warning of impending problems”, limit the world’s ability to cushion the blow on poor families suddenly faced with rising food prices, and increase public dissatisfaction with governments that fail to protect food security, ultimately leading to deeper hunger problems and socio-political unrest.
More than a quarter of the world’s population will face moderate or severe food insecurity by 2025, with more than 266 million people facing severe hunger this year, according to the World Health Organization and the United Nations World Food Program.
A looming food disaster
Hogan said the conflict around the Strait of Hormuz and the war in Ukraine “contribute to potential disasters in 2027 in many parts of the world,” adding that El Niño would further exacerbate the risks.
Fears of a global agricultural disaster are growing as the Middle East war and subsequent crisis in the strategically important Strait of Hormuz virtually halts the flow of fertilizer and energy exports. The FAO has warned that poorer countries are most at risk because delays in the supply of primary goods could lead to lower production, higher inflation and a weaker global economy.
The protracted war in Ukraine has also disrupted global wheat trade through the Black Sea, further exacerbating the economic impact and undermining food security in vulnerable countries. The prediction of a strong El Niño event could further threaten global food security.
We approach this problem blind and with one hand tied behind our backs in terms of the global ability to predict and respond to large-scale food crises.
chris newton
Food Security Analyst, International Crisis Group
Hogan said the agency’s reform plan must take into account tighter budgets. “We have to be conscious of the fact that we’re running out of money.”The first 100 days will focus on moving staff out of headquarters and into offices in so-called “hunger hotspots” characterized by severe food insecurity.
The nominees also emphasized cost efficiency and cooperation with other United Nations agencies in fulfilling the organization’s mission of providing regular access to sufficient, high-quality food and eradicating hunger and malnutrition.
The agency argued that it had been too silent on the Black Sea Grains Initiative. The initiative is currently suspended in a deal between Russia, Ukraine, Turkey and the United Nations to allow food and fertilizer exports from Ukraine after Russian aggression since 2022 has largely halted shipping traffic through Ukraine’s Black Sea ports, which were previously responsible for around 90% of Ukraine’s agricultural exports.
“Maybe FAO has become a bit behind the times by not taking up this issue and becoming more centrally involved in food security solutions within the UN family,” he said. Although the United Nations played an important role in the Black Sea Agreement, FAO was “not at the table”.
A Ukrainian Coast Guard soldier holds a gun on a patrol boat as a cargo ship passes by in the Black Sea during the Russian offensive on Ukraine, February 7, 2024.
Thomas Peter | Reuters
Chris Newton, a food security analyst at the International Crisis Group, said soaring interest rates and donor cuts, along with climate change, geopolitical conflict and a global fuel crisis, are making it difficult for the world to respond.
“We are approaching this problem blindsided and with one hand tied behind our backs in terms of the global ability to predict and respond to large-scale food crises.”
Some experts are less alarmed. Ian Mitchell, a senior policy fellow at the Center for World Development, said that despite the “very strong” El Niño event, “the conditions for a global food crisis are currently far below.” He said global grain stocks remain healthy by historical standards and futures markets do not suggest supply tightness.
