17 July 2023
Ahead of next week’s United Nations Food Systems Summit stocktaking event, the largest global food justice movements, small-scale food producer organizations, and Indigenous Peoples, representing millions of people across the world, have released a new statement denouncing the United Nations’ controversial approach to tackling hunger and malnutrition.
21 September 2021
An ever-increasing number of voices from outside and inside the Summit, including governments, academia and the UN, share the view that the self-proclaimed “People’s Summit” is destined for failure.
UN Food Systems Pre-Summit falls short on climate, hunger crisis, COVID-19, and food systems transformation, say counter-mobilization participants, totalling almost 9,000 people.
3 August 2021
Civil society and Indigenous Peoples’ organizations launch a global counter-mobilization against the UN Food Systems Pre-Summit from 25 to 28 July 2021 in Rome and online.
19 July 2021
Flagship UN Food Systems Summit Accused of ‘Selling the Corporate and Industrial Project’ Michaela Herrmann | Desmog3 August 2023 The UN’s “Stocktaking Moment” provided cover for industrial agriculture’s continued harms, critics claim.
Ernüchternde Bilanz des UN-Ernährungsgipfels Astrid Ehrenhauser | Tages Spiegel27 July 2023 Staaten, Organisationen, Unternehmen und Zivilgesellschaft kamen für drei Tage in Rom zusammen, um über die Zukunft unserer Ernährungssysteme zu diskutieren.
Un quinto del mondo è malnutrito. Fao: “Il sistema alimentare è malato, crescono gli affamati e l’inquinamento” Francesco De Augustinis | Huffington Post Italia 27 July 2023 Il cibo è responsabile di un terzo delle emissioni serra e del 90% della deforestazione tropicale.
Split on Africa Big-Agri sees boycott at UN food summit Francesco De Augustinis | Split27 July 2023 Where is the global food system headed? The different responses inside and outside the UN Food Systems Summit in Rome
Split on Africa Big-Agri sees boycott at UN food summit Francesco De Augustinis | EU Observer27 July 2023 The global food system is on the verge of failure: it is contributing in a decisive way to the environmental crisis and is failing in its main goal, to guarantee the right to food for the entire world population.
Hunger und Unterernährung: Die Hungerkurve zeigt nach oben Frank Braßel | Der Freitag27 July 2023 Die UN-Organisation für Ernährung und Landwirtschaft soll helfen, den Hunger in der Welt zu bekämpfen. Eine Allianz zwischen den USA und China gewährt Agrarmultis Einfluss auf die Organisation. Immer mehr Menschen leiden an Unterernährung.
Governare il diritto all’alimentazione Transform! Italia 26 July 2023 Gli Stati hanno il dovere di proteggere, rispettare e realizzare tali diritti e possono essere chiamati a rispondere se non lo fanno.
Intervista di Ivana Borsotto Radio Milano Popolare26 July 2023
Big agribusiness corporations have covertly captured key talks on the future of global food systems Hannah Sharland | The Canary 25 July 2023 If you needed a reminder that corporations rule the world, look no further than the United Nations’ (UN) answer to the planet’s broken food system.
L’Onu e gli errori sulla fame nel mondo: adesso fermi davvero le multinazionali La Stampa24 July 2023 Più di due miliardi di persone vivono senza il cibo, che è un diritto. Il vertice delle Nazioni Unite al via oggi a Roma non “venda” i più poveri.
Petrini: «Il cibo dev’essere un diritto, non un bene da scambiare in Borsa» Slow Food 24 July 2023 Per sfamare otto miliardi di persone, e in prospettiva dieci, la strada è tanto chiara quanto rivoluzionaria: smettere di inseguire il profitto e cominciare a difendere la produzione alimentare, la terra da cui essa dipende e le persone che la coltivano.
As the UNFSS+2 Opens in Rome, Counter-Mobilization Calls for Real Change in the Food System Instead of Advancing Industrial Food Production Slow Food24 July 2023 The UN Food Systems Summit (UNFSS) +2 Stocktaking Moment opens today in Rome, Italy, at the premises of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), organized in collaboration with International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), World Food Program (WFP), the UN Food Systems Coordination Hub and the wider UN system.
Kritik im Vorfeld des UN-Ernährungsgipfels in Rom Transform! Italia 21 July 2023 Der dreitägige UN-Ernährungsgipfel kommende Woche in Rom soll eine Bestandsaufnahme auf dem Weg zu nachhaltigen Ernährungssystemen liefern.
Governing the right to Food Nora McKeon | Project Syndicate21 July 2023 By emphasizing a multi-stakeholder approach to political decision-making, international institutions have enabled corporate actors to dominate the conversation about how and what we eat. But addressing hunger and malnutrition requires a strategy that focuses on human rights and government accountability.
UN should be learning from sustainable food producers – not hosting Big Ag Shalmali Guttal and Sofía Monsalve | Open Democracy 21 July 2023We again stand firm against the Summit’s continued influence, reflected in this Stocktaking Moment, and the US government’s repeated involvement in this process.
Social Movements and Indigenous Peoples Oppose the UN Food Systems Summit and Call for True Food Systems Change Pressenza19 July 2023 Ahead of next week’s United Nations Food Systems Summit stocktaking event, the largest global food justice movements, small-scale food producer organizations, and Indigenous Peoples, representing millions of people across the world, have released a new statement denouncing the United Nations’ controversial approach to tackling hunger and malnutrition.
Global Food Justice Movement Warns Against Corporate Takeover of UN Food Summit Olivia Rosane | Common Dreams19 July 2023 "Don't appoint the goat as gardener, a peasant proverb says," one advocate said of inviting agricultural companies to weigh in on issues of global food security.
For an answer to global hunger, look to peasants, not multinational corporations National Family Farm CoalitionJuly 2023We again stand firm against the Summit’s continued influence, reflected in this Stocktaking Moment, and the US government’s repeated involvement in this process.
Un cambio di rotta sui sistemi alimentari subito, per salvare il diritto al cibo e il pianeta Slow FoodJuly 2023 Il sostegno delle organizzazioni italiane impegnate per il diritto al cibo ai movimenti sociali e dei Popoli Indigeni che si oppongono al nuovo Summit delle Nazioni Unite sui Sistemi Alimentari (UNFSS+2) che si apre lunedì 24 luglio a Roma.
Food Systems Transformation: in Which Direction? FIANJuly 2023 There is growing resistance to the upcoming UN Food Systems Summit and a clash between consolidating corporate-driven industrial food systems and human rights-based, agroecological food system transformation.
Social movements, indigenous people oppose UN food systems summit Neel Kamal| Times of India19 July 2023
UN Food Security System Summit challenged by social movements News Ghana14 July 2023
Assalto delle multinazionali al cibo Comune Info9 July 2023 I movimenti sociali, i popoli indigeni e le organizzazioni della società civile continuano la lotta contro l’assalto delle multinazionali alla governance alimentare globale. Roma si appresta ad ospitare, il 24 luglio, un nuovo Summit delle Nazioni Unite sui Sistemi Alimentari, il cosiddetto Stocktaking Moment del UNFSS+2: ancora una volta i movimenti sociali che nel 2009 hanno promosso la riforma del Comitato per la Sicurezza Alimentare, denunciano i pericoli del controllo corporativo dei sistemi alimentari che questo summit purtroppo sta promuovendo
A Human-Rights Approach to the Global Food Crisis Michael Fakhri, Elisabetta Recine and Sofía Monsalve | Project Syndicate23 June 2023 Brazil has shown how popular resistance can galvanize support for policies and programs that enshrine the right to food and nutrition. To reduce acute hunger worldwide, it will be essential for countries and international organizations to push for systemic change based on human-rights principles.
Social movements, Indigenous Peoples, and civil society organizations continue to fight against corporate capture of global food governance Peoples' Autonomous Response to the UNFSS11 May 2023 Social movements, Indigenous Peoples, and civil society organizations are standing firm in their opposition to the corporate capture of global food governance and multistakeholderism, as the UN Food Systems Summit (UNFSS) advances its agenda. This opposition was previously demonstrated through successful counter-mobilization efforts in 2021, and will continue as the UNFSS prepares for the Stocktaking Moment conference in Rome from 24-26 July 2023.
Breaking the Cycle of Unsustainable Food Systems, Hunger and Debt IPES Food March 2023 The food price crisis is entering a dangerous new phase – a debt crisis that is plunging millions more into hunger. IPES-Food’s new special report urges decision-makers to act on comprehensive debt relief and food system transformation, before it’s too late.
Who's tipping the scales? The growing influence of corporationson the governance of food systems,and how to counter it IPES Food March 2023 Amid an ongoing food price crisis, climate change, and worsening hunger and malnutrition, it is vital to tackle the power imbalances in the institutions, policies, regulations, and norms that affect decision-making about our food systems. This briefing note provides a historical overview of corporate influence on food system governance, takes stock of the new ways in which decision-making processes are being captured, and identifies a path forward to democratic governance and corporate accountability.
The Global Food Crisis, this time Focus on the Global SouthNovember 2022 A perfect storm is brewing in the global food system, pushing food prices to record high levels, and expanding hunger. The continuing fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic, the Russia-Ukraine War, climate-related disasters and a breakdown of supply chains have led to widespread protests across the global South triggered by the spiraling food prices and shortages.
Cambiare le regole del gioco per raggiungere la sovranità alimentare Mani Tese - Nora McKeonJune 2022 I problemi e le sfide per creare un sistema del cibo davvero sostenibile: intervista a Nora McKeon, esperta di politiche alimentari.
Risks of the increased systemic corporate capture fuelled by the UN Food Systems Summit and its follow-up process Peoples' Autonomous Response to the UNFSS20 May 2022This document has been drafted by the Liaison Group, anchored within the Civil Society and Indigenous Peoples Mechanism (CSIPM) for relations with the Committee on World Food Security (CFS), based on inputs from the global counter-mobilization process Autonomous People’s Response to the UN Food Systems Summit.
Who is governing our food systems? - Online Event European regional stream of the Peoples' Autonomous Response to the UNFSS08 February 2022 On February 9th, European members of the Peoples’ Autonomous Response to the UNFSS are organising a webinar to explore with Members of the EU Parliament and the Commission how global public food governance is being reconfigured and the main threats compromising its democratic foundations.
How Biotech Crops Can Crash—and Still Never Fail Aniket Aga, Maywa Montenegro de Wit - Scientific American27 December 2021 The United Nations Food Systems Summit held last September was eclipsed by a powerful countermobilization effort led by farmers and scientists, as well as civil society groups allied with Indigenous communities and small-scale food producers across the world. These are the very people critical to achieving the summit’s stated goals of ending hunger and promoting sustainable agriculture. The scientists and advocates accused summit organizers of compromising on food security, democratic accountability, sustainability, and the human rights of producers and workers in favor of transnational agribusinesses.
Decolonizing the GMO debate Benjamin R. Cohen - The Counter16 December 2021 I had the fortune to teach a food studies class last spring. It had been about a dozen years since I did so, occupied as I was teaching courses in technology and environmental studies more generally. The differences were stark. In the late 2000s, I built the class in the middle of the “Pollanated” era of reform and Food Inc., when readers still wondered about buying local and debated the new U.S. Department of Agriculture organic label. As with the broader local food movement of the era, The Omnivore’s Dilemma was the class’s centerpiece. It fit the time. It went well.
The Gates Foundation should fund better solutions to hunger and nutrient deficiencies Million Belay, Heather Day, Steve Gloyd - Real Change News24 November 2021 The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation announced a $922 million investment to address global malnutrition and hunger at the controversial United Nations Food Systems Summit this September. We commend the foundation for investing in nutrition; unfortunately, its focus on food fortification, technical assistance and research into new “high-impact” innovations misses the mark on the root causes of hunger and malnutrition — and the needed solutions. .
The Reassurance of the Unknown: A Conversation with Nettie Wiebe Barbara Van Dyck & Nettie Wiebe - Development Journal10 November 2021 What knowledges and ways of knowing are considered valid in the context of global food governance? What is the relation between the prominence that is given to science and technology in the 2021 United Nations Food Systems Summit and the attempt to redefine food systems? What are the issues with the capturing and privatization of knowledge that people of the land have been passing over from generations to generations? These are some of the questions that are discussed in this thought-provoking conversation in which Nettie Wiebe shares her insights and experiences as a long-standing women peasant farm leader.
Bogus ‘Nature Based Solutions’ Won’t Solve the Climate Crisis Kirtana Chandrasekaran - Novara Media9 November 2021 ‘Nature-based solutions’ to the climate crisis are the talk of the town at Cop26. This year’s Cop presidency has made nature one of its top priorities. High-profile speeches from the likes of UN secretary general António Guterres and veteran environmentalist David Attenborough have highlighted the huge potential of nature to help tackle climate collapse. Indeed, the first so-called pledge to come out of Cop26 from world leaders was to end deforestation. Clearly, it’s an intoxicating idea: after decades of inaction, nature can come to save us from climate breakdown. But the concept of nature-based solutions is a wolf in sheep’s clothing – and one that will likely lead to massive violations of Indigenous rights.
Let’s Reclaim Our Food Sovereignty and Reject the Industrial Food System! Nora McKeon - Development Journal8 November 2021 African food systems are a rich and varied tapestry of production systems, crops, seed, territorial markets, cultures, biodiversity and ecologies. As the UN Food Systems Summit worked to retrench the many pathologies that have systematically eroded African food systems, African civil society organizations mobilized to push back. In the African regional people’s countermobilization, participatory dialogues opened space for continent-wide articulations of a future built on peoples’ choices and control of natural resources, territorially-embedded solutions, the human rights of all, family farming, and peasant agroecology.
Resetting Power in Global Food Governance: The UN Food Systems Summit Maywa Montenegro de Wit, Matt Canfield, Alastair Iles, Molly Anderson, Nora McKeon, Shalmali Guttal, Barbara Gemmill-Herren, Jessica Duncan, Jan Douwe van der Ploeg & Stefano Prato - Development Journal3 November 2021 The October 2019 announcement by UN Secretary General António Guterres of a UN Food Systems Summit (UNFSS) acknowledged the dire conditions of the global food system. Today there is widespread consensus among a growing number of scientists, civil society organizations, and governments that the global food system cannot be sustained in its current configuration—economically, ecologically, or socially.
Civil society concerned about the post UN Food Systems Summit process Rural 211 November 2021 The Civil Society and Indigenous Peoples’ Mechanism (CSM) for relations with the UN Committee on World Food Security (CFS) has expressed “deep concerns about the implications of the UNFSS for the work and mandate of the CFS, and multilateralism more broadly” in a recent press release.
The Latin American and Caribbean Counter-Mobilization Against the UN Food Systems Summit: Magdalena Ackermann in Conversation with Saúl Vicente and Sofía Monsalve Magdalena Ackermann, Saúl Vicente & Sofía Monsalve - Development Journal27 October 2021 What is the diagnosis of the main problems of the Latin American and Caribbean region, including the corporate capture of food systems? How did the regional counter-mobilization against the UN Food Systems Summit arise? What were the positions of the Latin American governments and regional organizations on the Summit? What is the common vision for overcoming corporate food systems? These are some of the questions that are discussed in this thought-provoking conversation with Sofía Monsalve and Saúl Vicente, in which they share their insights and experiences on the challenges of the Latin American region and the outcomes of the regional counter-mobilization against the UN Food Systems Summit.
The problem with climate conferences: towards a more radical approach Georgie Hurst 27 October 2021 The transformation of our food system is necessary if the world is to meet the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals of zero hunger by 2030 and net-zero emissions by 2050. According to the UN, food systems are responsible for one-third of global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, while more than 8.9 percent of the world population are still hungry.
Refusal as Radical Care? Moving Beyond Modern Industrial Agriculture Saurabh Arora & Barbara Van Dyck 27 October 2021 In this contribution we approach the refusal of modern industrial agriculture, as an act of radical care. We begin by recognizing the unprecedented crises of biodiversity losses and climate disruptions, amidst widespread inequality in a global pandemic, which are linked with modern agricultural development. This development is underpinned by the objectification of ‘nature’ that is designed into strategies and technologies of extraction and control like chemical pesticides, synthetic fertilizers, hybrid seeds, genetic engineering and digitalization. Refusal of strategies and technologies of modern objectification, we argue, is an act of radical care that is geared towards nurturing alternatives grounded in the Earth’s pluriverse.
Re-imagining the UN Committee on World Food Security Shalmali Guttal - Development journal22 October 2021 This article argues that the United Nations Committee on World Food Security can and must serve as a space for catalyzing and strengthening public interest-oriented food systems governance grounded in the human rights framework. This would necessarily entail confronting the fragmentation of governance and erasure of accountability promoted by corporate designed multi-stakeholderism, and democratizing multilateralism through genuine participation of rights holders, public scrutiny and participatory science. Pivotal to this endeavor is arresting the growing corporate influence in governance mechanisms and reorienting them towards reinvigorating relationships among people, communities and governments.
S hock and Awe in the UNFSS Philip McMichael - Development journal22 October 2021 The unholy alliance between the UN and the World Economic Forum in staging a Food Systems Summit is the culmination of deepening public partnerships with the corporate food sector on an international scale. This article examines how the WEF has exploited this relationship to position its private constituency to oversee global food market governance at the expense of multilateral principles, and against China’s expanding state-centered model of international self-reliance.
Disparity to Parity to Solidarity: Balancing the Scales of International Agricultural Policy for Justice and Viability Garrett Graddy-Lovelace & Patti Naylor - Development journal22 October 2021 Resetting international agricultural governance requires a collective commitment to changing the economic rules of production. This article reports on the challenging questions raised by the Disparity to Parity project, led by a group of farmer-activists, farmer organizations, and scholar-activists in the US. How can parity policies be updated, expanded, redesigned with and for Black, Indigenous, immigrant, cooperative, female and gender diverse farmers and would-be farmers? How does the parity movement join in global solidarity to reset the international agricultural economic and trade rules to reverse the globalization of agriculture that dumps surplus and undermines food sovereignty?
Towards Building Comprehensive Legal Frameworks for Corporate Accountability in Food Governance Daniel Dorado, Sofía Monsalve, Ashka Naik & Ana María Suárez - Development journal22 October 2021 Given the failures of the UN Food Systems Summit and Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) to tackle the problems related to the corporate capture of food governance, this article calls for developing comprehensive legal frameworks for corporate accountability in food governance. In doing so, the authors identify key regulatory elements that need to be taken into account in food governance discussions. Their recommendations are borrowed from the guidance developed in the context of the negotiations for an International Legally Binding Instrument on TNCs and other Businesses with Respect to Human Rights, as well as in the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, the WHO Framework of Engagement with Non-State Actors, and the WHO Financial Regulations and Financial Rules.
Indovina chi c’è dietro la paralisi sul CoVid-19 nel Comitato sulla sicurezza alimentare mondiale Nora McKeon - Transform! Italia20 October 2021 “Il COVID 19 ha moltiplicato le sfide della fame e della malnutrizione. Abbiamo bisogno di un’azione trasformativa!“. Il primo oratore alla 49a sessione plenaria del Comitato delle Nazioni Unite per la Sicurezza Alimentare Mondiale (CFS), il Segretario Generale delle Nazioni Unite, ha acceso i riflettori sugli impatti disastrosi della pandemia che hanno afflitto le comunità di tutto il mondo per quasi due anni.
UN Food System Summit Fails to Address Real Healthy and Sustainable Diets Challenges Janine Giuberti Coutinho, Ana Paula Bortoletto Martins, Potira V. Preiss, Lorenza Longhi & Elisabetta Recine 20 October 2021 Evidence of the impacts of corporate food systems on people’s health raised concerns about the multiple outcomes of malnutrition and climate change, including commodities production and high consumption of ultra-processed food products. The COVID-19 pandemic overwhelms this scenario, highlighting the urgency for improvements in governance spaces and regulatory measures that can tackle the advance of large corporations, which act exclusively based on their private interests.
China and the UN Food System Summit: Silenced Disputes and Ambivalence on Food Safety, Sovereignty, Justice, and Resilience Li Zhang - Development Journal20 October 2021 China is a major agricultural power. It dramatically reduced hunger and increased its role in many forums for international governance. However, the Chinese government and society neither played a prominent role in the UNFSS nor in its critique. This article exposes how tensions and ambivalence about agroecology and food sovereignty in China create silences in these discussions, and addressing them within China can also resolve the global tensions that marked the UNFSS as a whole.
Guess Who’s Behind Paralysis on COVID19 in the UN Committee on World Food Security Nora McKeon - IPS News19 October 2021 ‘COVID 19 has multiplied hunger and malnutrition challenges. We need transformative action!’ The first speaker at the UN Committee on World Food Security’s (CFS) 49th Plenary Session, the Secretary-General of the United Nations, turned the spotlight on the disastrous impacts of the pandemic that have afflicted communities around the world for close to two years.
Woke Science and the 4th Industrial Revolution: Inside the Making of UNFSS Knowledge Maywa Montenegro de Wit and Alastair Iles - Development journal19 October 2021 Understanding how science, technology, and innovation is produced by the UN Food Systems Summit process offers a lens into how dominant actors in global food policy continually rework their power and legitimacy. Focusing on discourses and material networks, the article shows that the Scientific Group makes appeals to inclusivity—of people of colour, women, youth, smallholders, and more—while extending old Green Revolution ideas through new 4th Industrial Revolution innovations and governance ambitions.
Digital farm technology is no climate panacea Astrud Lea Beringer - The Ecologist18 October 2021 Smartphones have revolutionised our way of living. No need to visit a library when looking for information – we just go online. Convenience is convincing. But can digital technology solve all the problems in the world? The idea of going high-tech in agriculture gained traction as a silver bullet against world hunger and climate breakdown during the corporate-backed UN Food Systems Summit (UNFSS) last month.
A Trade Agenda for the Right to Food Michael Fakhri - Development journal13 October 2021 Whoever benefits from a trade regime in effect gains power over significant aspects of different food systems. And yet the WTO still does not provide a coherent food policy and the 2021 UN Food Systems Summit made very little space for trade policy. The degree of international trade policy discord and supply chain fragility strongly suggests that there must be new international trade negotiations around fundamental questions of principle. Seeing little benefit in reforming the WTO, this article explains how the trade agenda for the right to food could focus on territorial markets and negotiating new types of treaties, International Food Agreements.
From Food as Commodity to Food as Liberation Atun Kuljay, Jean-Marc Louvin, Molly Anderson, Naseegh Jaffer and Tomaso Ferrando - Development journal13 October 2021 For the capitalist way of organizing people and nature, food is nothing but a commodity. Any meaningful transformation of the dominant food system must thus be based on the decommodification and liberation of food and all the elements that make food systems possible (labour, land, seeds, etc.). The notions of commons and commoning can be allies in this journey, helping different anti-capitalist fights to converge and avoid corporate cooptation.
African agriculture without African farmers Alex Park and Siera Vercillo - Al Jazeera9 October 2021 With the passing of the United Nations’ highly contested Food Systems Summit last month, the task of “feeding the world” has taken on a newfound urgency.But one point apparently lost on the summit’s attendees is that the project of “agricultural modernisation” which many of them have supported for decades is only making food insecurity worse in recent years, especially in Africa.
Did the First UN Food Systems Summit Give Corporations Too Much of a Voice? Greta Moran - Civil Eats29 September 2021 In a speech delivered at the first United Nations Food System Summit, held in New York on September 23rd and joined by global leaders virtually, U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres called for food systems that work for everyone.“We need systems that can support prosperity—not just the prosperity of businesses and shareholders, but the prosperity of farmers and food workers, and indeed, the billions of people worldwide who depend on this industry for their livelihoods” said the U.N. chief.
Billions pledged and awareness raised, but UN food summit fails to heal divisions Thin Lei Win - The New Humanitarian28 September 2021 The first-ever Food Systems Summit, held virtually last week, raised the profile of global food challenges and touted thousands of potential solutions. But the divisions that marred the lead-up to the UN-run event show little signs of healing, and some critics branded it a failure. In a whirlwind of videos and speeches, more than 150 attendees – from 86 world leaders to dozens of donors, farmers, Indigenous representatives, UN officials, and business executives – laid out their visions of a well-fed future based on fairer, more nutritious, and greener food systems.
Ernährungsgipfel gescheitert: Zwei Jahre Energie und Ressourcen in die falschen Bahnen gelenkt Forum Umwelt und Entwicklung 28 September 2021 Seit dem Ausbruch der Covid-19-Pandemie im Winter 2019 ist die Anzahl der Hungernden weltweit drastisch angestiegen. Umweltkatastrophen häufen sich, die Klimakrise spitzt sich weiter zu, es gibt immer mehr bewaffnete Konflikte und Kriege. Zusammen führen sie zu vermehrten Hungerkatastrophen in der Zivilbevölkerung. Die UN hätte längst die überfällige Trendwende einleiten müssen, doch der am 23. September 2021 ausgerichtete Welternährungsgipfel des UN-Generalsekretärs António Guterres (UN Food Systems Summit, UNFSS) in New York hat dieses Ziel deutlich verfehlt.
Social Movements And Scientists Are Challenging the UN Food Systems Summit’s Agenda Food TankSeptember 2021 The U.N. Food Systems Summit (UNFSS) will take place in New York on September 23. But more than 300 civil society organizations and Indigenous groups are boycotting the event due to concerns over exclusion from the agenda-setting process.The U.N. Secretary General announced the convening of the UNFSS on World Food Day 2019 to drive meaningful change in the food system and achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030. Since its inception, the Summit has promised to engage stakeholders from across the food system, including farmers and fishers, governments, businesses, and civil society.
UNFSS | Der Ernährungsgipfel des UN-Generalsekretärs: Konzerne diktieren Staaten wie Ernährungssysteme zu transformieren sind Forum Umwelt und Entwicklung September 2021 Können wir eine Zukunft verantworten, wo Nahrung zur Kapitalanlage wird und Roboter und Drohnen unsere Kleinbäuer*innen ersetzen? Der dominante Einfluss von Konzernen und der Finanzwelt im diesjährigen UN-Welternährungsgipfel (UN-Food Systems Summit, UNFSS) am 23. September in New York gibt diesem Zukunftsbild erste Konturen. Trotz scharfer Kritik von Seiten der internationalen und nationalen Zivilgesellschaft hat die UN erstmalig die Diskussionstische für unterschiedliche Akteure – von Konzernen über Banken und philanthropischen Organisationen – mittels eines Multi-Stakeholder-Ansatzes zugänglich gemacht.
28/09/2021
William G Moseley - Al Jazeera
With almost 768 million people facing hunger in 2020, up some 118 million from the previous year, the global food system is in trouble. World leaders gathered in New York on September 23 for the United Nations Food Systems Summit to address this crisis and make commitments leading to meaningful progress on ending hunger by 2030, one of the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development goals.
P.K. Balachandran - Daily Mirror
Even as the US announced amulti-year investment of US$ 10 billion in global food security, climate change and adaptation (subject to Congressional approval),The Guardian reported that 600 groups and individuals had signed a statement saying that they “reject the ongoing corporate colonization of food systems and food governance under the facade of the United Nations Food Systems Summit because the struggle for sustainable, just and healthy food systems cannot be unhooked from the realities of the peoples whose rights, knowledge and livelihoods have gone unrecognized and disrespected.”
27/09/2021
Marc Fawcett-Atkinson - Canada's National Observer
An international conference aimed at tackling hunger and reducing the environmental impact of our food could end up making the situation worse — including in Canada, farmers — activists, and scholars are warning.The UN Food Systems Summit (UNFSS), a virtual event held Thursday from New York City, was branded as a “historic opportunity” for countries, businesses, NGOs, and other organizations to collaborate on fixing the world's food systems, a catch-all term that refers to the complex paths food takes from farm to fork.
24/09/2021
Joseph Winters - Grist
Two years of discussions and negotiations culminated on Thursday and Friday, as stakeholders from around the world convened for the first-ever United Nations Food Systems Summit. The event had been branded as a “historic opportunity to empower all people to leverage the power of food systems,” both to drive the global recovery from COVID-19 and to help the U.N. achieve its 17 Sustainable Development Goals by 2030.
A runa Chandrasekhar and Giuliana Viglione - Carbon Brief
The two-day UN Food Systems Summit concluded this week with around 150 countries announcing voluntary commitments to ensure more “resilient, inclusive and sustainable” food systems around the world.Among the national strategies announced at the virtual meeting, Japan committed to decarbonising their food systems and Norway pledged to address deforestation impacts in supply chains.
23/09/2021
Silvia Richter - Rural21
Large corporations are playing an increasingly important role in food systems throughout the world, also with regard to assets such as land and water. In this interview, Shalmali Guttal calls for a greater focus on the public purpose of food systems and food.
Nina Lakhani - The Guardian
Hundreds of civil society groups, academics and social movements are boycotting the first UN global food summit amid growing anger that the agenda has been hijacked by an opaque web of corporate interests.Called the people’s summit by UN organisers, groups representing thousands of small-scale farmers and Indigenous communities, which produce 70% of the world’s food through sustainable agriculture, are among those to withdraw from Thursday’s event saying their knowledge and experience has been ignored.
Hans Herren - Thomson Reuters
It should have been a leap forward for the future of the planet, but instead it’s been a textbook example of how not to run a summit. The UN Food Systems Summit was designed to turn the page on our failing food system and point the way towards a climate-resilient, food-secure, and equitable future. Instead, we’re back to square one: a grab bag of good, bad, and ugly ‘solutions,’ yet a deafening silence on the root causes of the problems we face.
Paula Gioia - Deutsche Welle
The Food Systems Summit in New York is supposed to come up with a global strategy to fight hunger and feed a rapidly growing world population.But it's focused too much on the big agro-industry. Corporate interests are taking center stage and expanding their influence in the UN system to an alarming extent, undermining democratic decisions. The concerns of peasant farmers like myself, who produce over 70% of the world’s food, are sidelined even though we provide a vital contribution to the food agenda through ecological and fair farming methods.
Michael Fakhri - The Guardian
The role of the UN’s dozens of independent experts, or special rapporteurs, is to report and advise on various human rights. My role revolves around the right to food – which is under enormous threat.The world’s food systems have been failing people for a long time. The climate crisis is ravaging the planet, biodiversity diminishes every day and food insecurity is on the rise.
20/09/2021
Mike Shanahan - China Dialogue
The global food system is a mess. The way we produce, transport, consume and waste food is destroying nature, degrading soil, and polluting air and water. It powers climate change, accounting for around one-third of humanity’s greenhouse gas emissions.
Elizabeth Mpofu and Henk Hobbelink - The Guardian
Thursday’s UN food summit proposes to help solve the world’s nutrition crisis, with 800 million people going hungry and 1.9 billion labelled obese, by better aligning food systems with development goals. But it won’t achieve any of this. The summit was hijacked early on by powerful corporate interests – but people are resisting.
Astrud Beringer - IPS Journal
It wasn’t that long ago that some people began to hoard food when the pandemic began. Others suddenly found themselves helpless, staring at empty supermarket shelves. More recently, the Covid-19 crisis has shown us how fragile the just-in-time supply chains that dominate our food system are.The UN Food Systems Summit will take place in New York on 23 September.This could become a prime opportunity for corporations to try to legitimise greenwashing practices as a means of tackling climate change and global hunger – a dangerous trend.
Nyeleni Newsletter
T his year marks 25 years since the paradigm of food sovereignty was launched at the World Food Summit 1996 in Rome as a direct challenge to market-based food security promoted through the World Trade Organisation (WTO).
Jennifer Peltz - APNews
Nations, companies and foundations pledged billions of dollars to feed the world in connection with an ambitious United Nations food summit Thursday, while some grassroots anti-hunger groups and food experts blasted the event as too corporate, tech-focused and top-down.Held as part of the annual U.N. General Assembly meeting of world leaders, the “food systems summit” aimed to tackle the life-and-death puzzle of hunger, nutrition, environmental sustainability and inequality.
BBC Sounds
N nimmo Bassey from Health of Mother Earth Foundation (HOMEF) in Nigeria -- was interviewed about UNFSS on BBC World Service Focus on Africa. Starts at 4:50.
Nils M cCune and Camila Escalante - The Grayzone
This September 23, the United Nations holds its Food Systems Summit in New York.Under the guise of the UN system, and despite sleight-of-hand language about “equal opportunities,” this summit represents a hostile takeover of world governance by corporate forces and the billionaire elite.Today, social movements are standing up for democracy and against big capital’s devastation of their lands, farms, and communities.
Democracy Now!
More than 500 civil society groups boycotted the United Nations Food Systems Summit in New York for giving corporations an outsized role in framing the agenda. We speak with leading food advocates in Ethiopia, India and the United States, who lay out their concerns: Million Belay, general coordinator of the Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa; Raj Patel, journalist and research professor at the University of Texas at Austin; and Shalmali Guttal, executive director of Focus on the Global South.
With hunger growing across the globe during the pandemic, the United Nations is holding its first Food Systems Summit, but the gathering is facing fierce criticism for giving corporations an outsized role framing the agenda. The United Nations’ own experts on food, human rights and the environment released a statement warning the summit could “serve the corporate sector” over the needs of workers, small producers, women and Indigenous peoples around the world.
Septetmber 2021
Oakland Institute
“Farmers and civil society organizations were not consulted when the summit was being organized and it is not inclusive, but only focusing on the big agribusiness players… that is why the boycott has been so intensive.”Elizabeth Mpofu“It's not grounded in people's rights, but in corporate rights. And it doesn't look actually for system change, but for maintaining this system, in a way that extends the control of the corporate power.”Alejandro Argumedo
September 2021
The first episode in a two part series exploring resistance to the upcoming UN Food Systems Summit and mapping out sustainable, bottom-up approaches to food sovereignty. Featuring Nnimmo Bassey (Health of Mother Earth Foundation) and Kristen Lyons (Professor of Environment and Development Sociology, U Queensland), with an introduction by Chivy Sok.
22/09/2021
Karen McVeigh - The Guardian
The UN global food summit is “elitist and regressive” and has failed in its goal of being a “people’s summit”, according to the special rapporteur on food rights. As world leaders prepare to attend the virtual event on Thursday, which aims to examine ways to transform global food systems to be more sustainable, Michael Fakhri said it risked leaving behind the very people critical for its success.
FIAN International and Zago Brothers
Our food systems are increasingly controlled by a small number of powerful corporations. Corporate control over what we eat and grow undermines the human right to food and nutrition in multiple ways, and leads to hunger and malnutrition. Radical transformation of food systems is more urgent than ever.
People Vs. Agribusiness Corporations: The Battle Over Global Food and Agriculture Governance offers a detailed look and analysis of how the 2021 Food Systems Summit became the most uneventful UN event. The appointment of the President of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), as UN Special Envoy of the summit, was the lightning rod that catalyzed global opposition.
Mr. Michael Fakhri, Special Rapporteur on Right to Food, Mr. David Boyd, Special Rapporteur on human rights and the environment; and Mr. Olivier de Schutter, Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights
GENEVA (22 September 2021) - UN human rights experts said today they are deeply concerned that this week’s UN Food Systems Summit will not be a “people’s summit” as promised, and the most marginalized and vulnerable will be left behind.“The Summit claims to be inclusive, but many participants and over 500 organizations representing millions of people feel ignored and disappointed,” the independent experts said in a statement ahead of the 23 September Summit on building healthier, more sustainable and more equitable food systems around the world.
Sofia Monsalve - Geneva Solutions
Transnational agribusiness firms have captured the UN Food Systems Summit and have restricted the meeting's agenda to solutions that will further inflate their profits instead of solving the global hunger crisis, says Sofia Monsalve, secretary general of the food rights organisation FIAN International.When I visited my parents in Bogotá last month, I witnessed how people in their neighborhood went up and down the streets begging for help to survive.
Marc Wegerif & Ruth Hall - Business Day
The UN Food Systems Summit, which opens on Thursday in New York, was supposed to mark a global breakthrough — the moment at which governments, the private sector and civil society finally came together in support of a holistic, people-focused approach to food production, distribution and consumption.When I visited my parents in Bogotá last month, I witnessed how people in their neighborhood went up and down the streets begging for help to survive.
Natasha Foote - Euractiv
A group of UN human rights experts have joined in the criticism of this week’s UN Food Systems Summit, warning in a statement that instead of having the promised “people’s summit”, the most marginalised and vulnerable risk being left behind.The self-titled “people’s summit” will be held in New York on Thursday (23 September) as part of ambitions to build healthier, more sustainable and more equitable food systems around the world.
Marc Wegerif, Ayanda Madlala, Nkanyiso Gumede and Ruth Hall - Daily Maverick
The High Level Panel of Experts on Food Security and Nutrition declared that a “food system gathers all the elements [environment, people, inputs, processes, infrastructures, institutions, etc] and activities that relate to the production, processing, distribution, preparation and consumption of food, and the outputs of these activities, including socio-economic and environmental outcomes”. The most important outputs of a food system are people enjoying their right to food (or food and nutrition security) and improving livelihoods, especially for those in the food system.
Farida Akhter - The Business Standard
The global actors in the food business are now busy finding or creating markets for industrial food products. Countries with a large population, where laws and regulatory authorities are absent or weak, are generally the targets. Categories such as 'nutrition,' 'micro-nutrients,' etc play a role in constituting new corporate markets.
Raj Patel - Scientific American
Although it is the sharp edge of the battle to end hunger, you could be forgiven for thinking you were watching a reality TV cooking show. Under the low peak of Bwabwa Mountain in Malawi, in a village on a tributary of the Rukuru River, about 100 people gather around pots and stoves. Children crowd around a large mortar, snickering at their fathers’, uncles’ and neighbors’ ham-fisted attempts to pound soybeans into soy milk. At another station, a village elder is being schooled by a man half his age in the virtues of sweet potato doughnuts.
La Via campesina
La Via Campesina is among scores of other social movements of organized small-scale food producers, workers and indigenous people boycotting the United Nations Food Systems Summit (UNFSS), slated to take place in New York – September 23rd, 2021. Peoples’ movements are united in condemning the illegitimacy of this ‘summit’ and in denouncing the attempt by transnational corporations to usurp the institutional spaces within the United Nations.
Million Belay - Al Jazeera
Organisers of this year’s African Green Revolution Forum claim the annual gathering that ended on September 10 provided a “single coordinated African voice” in advance of the upcoming United Nations Food Systems Summit. That voice sings the praises of capital-intensive technological innovation, with the host Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) playing conductor and trying to keep donors, governments, companies and UN agencies singing the same tune.
Benjamin Luig - Rosa Luxemburg
On 23 September, the Global Food Systems Summit will take place in New York as part of the UN General Assembly. What can be expected from the summit? The United Nations sees the Summit as a major participatory happening in which all kinds of stakeholder groups, from small farmers to consumers to financial investors, come together to discuss a fundamental transformation of food systems. „It is a summit for everyone everywhere – a peoples summit“, says the conference website.[1] Sounds nice, almost idyllic, but what does it mean? As a result of the Summit, a “Call for Action” and the development of general principles will be announced.
21/09/2021
Michael Fakhri and Lucía Guadagno - Rosa Luxemburg
This 23 September will mark the start of the United Nations’ Food Systems Summit, promoted by the World Economic Forum. Since it was announced last October, the Summit has faced numerous criticism from many different quarters, including members of the UN itself. Special rapporteurs and ex-officials from the UN warn about the increasingly worrisome influence of the concentrated private sector – Unilever, Bayer, Nestlé, Coca-Cola, Pepsico, Google, Amazon, Microsoft – on summits of this kind, which are aimed at agreeing on the general terms of a plan that then has an impact on countries’ public policies.
Zach Boren - Unearthed (Greenpeace)
A coalition of meat industry associations has pushed for the upcoming UN food systems summit to boost global meat consumption and promote intensive livestock farming despite its environmental footprint, Unearthed can reveal.The findings have prompted the UN special rapporteur on the right to food, Michael Fakhri, to warn that powerful agribusiness interests could “dominate the discussion”, leading to disappointing outcomes.
Davin Hutchins - Greenpeace
Scientists couldn’t be more clear. For humanity to avoid climate disaster and remain below the 1.5°C threshold set out in the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement, society must radically transform. We need to change our energy, transport, and food systems fundamentally and quickly. Why food? According to scientists from the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), land use for farming is responsible for one-quarter of all global greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs).
Sophie Kevany - The Guardian
Livestock groups have been lobbying the UN to support more meat and dairy production before a high-profile summit on food sustainability, documents reveal.Most experts agree that livestock are responsible for at least 14% of global emissions, while a study published last week found the use of animals for meat causes twice the planet-heating gases that plant-based foods do.The UN Food Systems Summit (UN FSS), taking place this week in New York, aims to make global agricultural systems more sustainable, billing itself as a transformational “people’s summit”.
Ruth Douglas - SciDev
Leaders from more than 85 countries will pledge their commitment to transforming food systems at the UN Food Systems Summit this week, but scientists say close monitoring of their actions beyond the talks will be the true test of success.The summit, being held virtually during the UN General Assembly high-level week in New York, is expected to include pledges on healthy meals for all schoolchildren, food waste reduction, and harnessing agricultural innovation to meet climate goals.
Jan Rübel - Brot für die Welt (BfdW)
Brot für die Welt (Bread for the World) did not attend the UNFSS pre-summit in Rome. Instead, the aid organisation took part in a counter-summit. The following conversation with Francisco Marí touched on the reasons for this, the course of events and the outlook for the future.
Nassim Nobari - Seed the commons
When the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) announced last October that it planned to build closer ties with CropLife International, the trade body of the pesticide industry, civil society and environmental organizations jumped into action. Eleven international organizations sponsored a letter to the Director General of the FAO that opposed the announced partnership.
Alberta Guerra, Catherine Gatundu and Tristan Quinn-Thibodeau - ActionAid
The United Nations Food Systems Summit (UNFSS) is rapidly approaching. The event on 23 September will be convened by UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, to catalyze commitments from governments and other actors to take swift action towards the transformation of the global food system; to ensure food security and address biodiversity loss and climate change.
Alison Kentish - IPS News
Dubbed ‘the People’s Summit, the United Nations Food Systems Summit (UNFSS) hopes to put the world back on a path to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030, through food systems overhauling. From the tempered to the extremely optimistic, experts in various food system sectors share their expectations of transformation.The world has been lagging on ambitious climate, biodiversity and sustainable development goals, but the UNFSS is hoping that commitments to transform global food systems will get the world back on track to meeting the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030.
Sofia Monsalve - Project Syndicate
Transnational agribusiness firms are contributing to a growing global hunger crisis, causing widespread environmental damage, and threatening people’s health. By also capturing the United Nations Food Systems Summit, they have restricted the meeting's agenda to solutions that will further inflate corporate profits.
Jayati Ghosh - Social Europe
Climate change is posing immediate threats to humanity, and indeed to all living organisms on the planet, in extreme weather events across the globe. Other environmental stresses include rising water levels or falling water tables, desertification and salination.Agriculture—especially industrial agriculture requiring chemical inputs—is cause and victim of these changes. Cultivation patterns such as mono-cropping, with heavy reliance on groundwater and chemical inputs, have reduced the food sovereignty of poor countries and generated growing environmental problems.
FIAN International
This will be underlined this week when three key UN reports on toxic substances, the right to a healthy environment and food systems are presented in Geneva and New York, just head of the UN Food Systems Summit. FIAN International has contributed to the momentum for change with a study of local experiences from around the world. Transitioning to pesticide free food systems: people´s power and imagination takes a bottom-up human rights approach and shows that a transition towards agroeology is underway in many parts of the world.
Nick Nisbett, Lesli Hoey and Jose Graziano da Silva - IPS News
COVID-19 has exposed numerous fractures in global food systems that leave millions at risk of food insecurity. Like the numerous political failures in dealing with COVID, the repercussions of food system failings are experienced by rich and poor countries alike, with the poorest and most marginalised paying the greatest price.To be clear, while the numbers of those who are undernourished remain shamefully high, this is a food crisis that is not just about hunger or famine.
17/09/2021
Lela Nargi - The Counter
On September 23, the United Nations will hold a first-of-its-kind Food Systems Summit in New York City. Conceived to help launch a “Decade of Action,” in which countries commit themselves in earnest to the organization’s 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs), the summit is meant to design “bold new actions to deliver progress on all 17 SDGs”—ranging from ending poverty and hunger to transitioning to clean energy and responsible consumption—”each of which relies to some degree on healthier...
GRAIN
The United Nation Food Systems Summit (UNFSS) will be held on 23 September 2021, at the UN General Assembly headquarters in New York. The summit is supposed to help solve the global food crisis, in which 800 million people face hunger and 1.9 billion suffer obesity, by better aligning food systems with the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. But it won’t do any of this. The summit was hijacked early on by corporate interests. It is officially sponsored by the World Economic Forum, the private foundation that brings the world’s global elite to Davos, Switzerland, every January.
Million Belay and Timothy Wise - IATP
As COVID-19 threatens farming communities across Africa already struggling with climate change, the continent is at a crossroads. Will its people and their governments continue trying to replicate industrial farming models promoted by developed countries? Or will they move boldly into the uncertain future, embracing ecological agriculture?
16/09/2021
Sandrine Dixson-Declève, José Antonio Ocampo and Felia Salim - Project Syndicate
Addressing the growing problem of food insecurity must be central to the global recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. But the debate in the run-up to the September 23 United Nations Food Systems Summit suggests that a practical consensus among governments, business, and civil-society groups may prove elusive.
Mobilisation in Rome in front of the FAO headquarters | 22 July
Final declaration of the alternative workshop on Food Systems in Haiti Spanish French Creole
Open Call for Civil Society and Indigenous Peoples’ Engagement to respond to the UN Food Systems Summit
DECLARACIÓN de la Movilización de la América Latina para desafiar la Cumbre de Sistemas Alimentarios de la ONU
Declaration Africa responds to the UN Food Systems Summit