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16 October 2008

The programme director
Premier of Eastern Cape, Honourable Mbulelo Sogoni
MEC for Agriculture in the province, Honourable Gugile Nkwinti
Country representative from Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), Ms Rosebud Kurwijila
Members of Parliament present here today
Members from the House of Traditional Leaders
Director-General of the Department of Agriculture, Ms Njabulo Nduli
Honourable mayors and councillors
Invited delegates from various institutions
Ladies and gentlemen

Some among ourselves will recall that yesterday we celebrated the World Rural Day; today we celebrate World Food Day marking the 28th anniversary of the World Food Day Commemorations and the 63rd anniversary of the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO).

16 October was proclaimed in 1979 by the Conference of the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) as the World Food Day. It marks the date of the founding of FAO in 1945.

This calendar day was proclaimed in 1979 by the Conference of the FAO aimed at reflecting and heightening public awareness of the world food problem and strengthening solidarity in the struggle against hunger, malnutrition and poverty.

During the World Food Summit in 1996, heads of state and governments reaffirmed "the right of everyone to have access to safe and nutritious food, consistent with the right to adequate food and the fundamental right of everyone to be free from hunger." These laudable efforts were given further imputes by the declaration of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in 2000.

Right here at home and in terms of Chapter 2, section 27.1b of the Constitution of South Africa (1996), government guarantees progressive social rights, that every citizen has the right to have access to sufficient food and water and that the State must take reasonable legislative and other measures, within its available resources, to achieve realisation of this right.

Furthermore, the Constitution mandates government departments to develop appropriate legislation and programmes to achieve the right to adequate and nutritious food.

Two roles of government in terms of the right to food approach can be identified as firstly, the creation of an environment in which the society members are able to produce their own food or empowered socio-economically to have a purchasing power and secondly, provide direct assistance to the poor and vulnerable through social safety nets.

It should be noted that food production through agriculture is influenced to a large extent by natural hazards such as floods, droughts, veldt fires, cold spells, as well as water and temperature fluctuations. These are the major challenges that have to be overcome in order to ensure sustainable human development and poverty alleviation.

Rural populations whose livelihoods depend on agriculture are often quite vulnerable to both the direct impacts of adverse climate events and the indirect effects of the unpredictability of the climate on longer time scales.

Furthermore, many critical agricultural decisions from farm to policy level, interact with climate, however, most must be made several months before the impact of the climate is realised. This implies that advances in the ability to predict climate fluctuations months in advance create an opportunity to improve management of climatic risks in the agricultural and water sectors to ensure national food security.

According to the 2005 Millennium Ecosystem Assessment estimates, climate change will be the main cause of biodiversity loss by the end of this century. Climate change also threatens fisheries as an important source of income and nutrition for some poor communities.

Crop losses as a result of pests and diseases are being exacerbated by changing climate, threatening food security and rural livelihoods. Agriculture is not only the victim of climate change but a source of greenhouse gases. The use of biofuel as an alternative to reduce carbon emissions and generate some independence from fossil fuels has crucial implications for food security as well as current and future land use.

In the recent past, the hype around biofuel has raised serious concerns about both its likely negative impact on food production and its possible benefits to the farmers, the agricultural sector and the economy at large. It is feared that crops such as maize, sorghum, sugar cane and sunflower meant for food production are now being geared for use in biofuel production. If the biofuel production initiative is handled injudiciously, it could lead to further price escalation in food price. The lure towards biofuel production can also deprive the rural poor of the benefits from the land, such as growing vegetables and maize for maize meal, fuel wood, local wild fruit and berries, insects, thatching grass and wood and grass for brooms as well as utensils that they get from currently underutilised land.

The rapidly growing demand for grain-based biofuel production (supported by subsidies in Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries) is one of the main reasons for food price increases. The poor communities will experience greater suffering as basic food will become unaffordable and inaccessible. It is worth noting, however, that if handled judiciously, coupled with the utilisation of relevant technologies biofuel production could increase incomes and employment in rural areas and improve rural energy security in ways that could offset the losses. A balance between the country's food security and bio-energy production is therefore of paramount importance.

These challenges require urgent attention and a paradigm shift in the way we do business. Consequently, in an effort to mitigate the risks associated with natural disasters, we are developing disaster risk reduction initiatives such as risk reduction policies, establishment and strengthening of a multipurpose, multi-hazard and people-centred Early Warning System (EWS) for the sector for all natural hazards. This effort can be achieved through the establishment of Disaster Risk Units in the provinces as well as having the Early Warning Committee functioning under these units to enhance effective information dissemination within government structures.

Talking about improving information dissemination, I am informed by the Director-General of the Department of Agriculture that extension workers are being capacitated on interpretation and usage of weather predictions to assist farmers in their planning and decision making. We have also added value to the daily extreme weather warnings issued by the South African Weather Service (SAWS) by attaching mitigation and adaptation strategies to the daily extreme warnings sent to the farming communities.

The Climate Change Sector Plan (CCSP) is being developed in line with the National Climate Change Response Strategy (NCCRS) and Disaster Management Framework. We are currently participating in the national, regional, international climate change forums such as the National Committee on Climate Change (NCCC) and United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). We have also funded the outsourced climate change projects, i.e. drought mapping for identification of the drought prone areas and the mitigation and adaptation options for agricultural production. We collaborated with external donors to conduct research on the greenhouse gases (GHG) inventory for the agricultural sector. It is envisaged that these research initiatives will inform policy on climate change, which will be incorporated into risk and disaster management policies.

With the progress on biofuel, the Cabinet approved the White Paper on Renewable Energy in 2004, setting out government's policy objective in respect of renewable energy. In 2007, the Cabinet approved an ambitious biofuel industrial strategy. This sets bold targets, including the aim for 4,5 percent of road transport fuels in South Africa to be replaced with biofuel by 2013. This will require a significant and comprehensive effort to establish agricultural producers and production plants. It is hoped that the draft biofuel plan will meet 75 percent cent of the country's renewable energy target, in compliance with the Kyoto Protocol on climate change, which encourages nations to reduce their reliance on fossil fuels.

We therefore have to deliberate a great deal on the effect of global warming if severe droughts continue in the region and the competition between the rich (filling their cars with biofuel) and the poor (food security) for energy crops to ensure that all South Africans have access to safe, sufficient and nutritious food.

Before I leave the podium I want to make reference to the 2008 Conference on World Food Security: The Challenges of Climate Change and Bio-energy concluded with the adoption of a Declaration on World Security that accentuates food security among participating nations:

"It is essential to address the question of how to increase the resilience of present food production systems to challenges posed by climate change…. We urge governments to assign appropriate priority to the agriculture, forestry and fisheries sectors, in order to create opportunities to enable the world's smallholder farmers and fishers, including indigenous people, in particular vulnerable areas, to participate in, and benefit from financial mechanisms and investment flows to support climate change adaptation, mitigation and technology development, transfer and dissemination.... We call upon relevant intergovernmental organisations, including FAO, within their mandates and areas of expertise, with the involvement of national governments, partnerships, the private sector, and civil society, to foster a coherent, effective and results-oriented international dialogue on biofuel in the context of food security and sustainable development needs."

With these few words I would like to say have a very happy World Food Day.

I thank you!

Issued by: Department of Agriculture
16 October 2008