Agro-Industria and SDGs on Food Crisis

General Assembly Second Committee

1/1.1 Strengthening UN Coordination of Agricultural Trade and Sustainable Development after the Food Crisis Agenda

Sponsor: Argentina

Signatories: MERCOSUR members (Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay and Venezuela)

The General Assembly,

Recalling all nations of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights 1948 – Article 25 (1) “Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.” (United Nations 2018),

Recalling the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment 1972, the provisions of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights 1966 and high-level task force of the Declaration to the Rights to Development 1986, the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development 1992 and Agenda 21, the Doha Development Round 2001, the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation 2002, the World Summit on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in 2015, and the implementation of and follow-up to major United Nations conferences and summits 72nd session on Agriculture Development, Food Security and Nutrition in 2017,

Reaffirming its Resolutions 71/245 on agriculture development, food security and nutrition reported to the General Assembly in the Seventy-second session regarding the scarcity and unsustainability of natural resources management and the uneven tenure rights for smallholders in rural areas (General Assembly of the United Nations 2017),

Reaffirming the achievements of the 8 goals of the MDGs and the 17 goals of the SDGs and its ongoing challenges related to poverty, inequality, climate, environmental degradation, prosperity, and peace and justice (SDGs 2018),

Noting with the failure to conclude the Doha Development Round adopted by the World Trade Organisation (WTO) in 2001 in achieving the global partnership for substantial progress of development envisaged in MDGs (MDG Gap Task Force Report 2015, p. 8),

Remaining concerns the goal set out in the United Nations Millennium Declaration (2000, para. 19) “to halve, by the year 2015, the proportion of the world’s people whose income is less than one dollar a day and the proportion of people who suffer from hunger and, by the same date, to halve the proportion of people who are unable to reach or to afford safe drinking water”,

Reiterating as in the Rome Declaration and the Declaration of the World Food Summit: five years later (FAO 2002), that “food should not be used as an instrument of political or economic pressure, and reaffirmed in this regard the importance of international cooperation and solidarity, as well as the necessity of refraining from unilateral measures that are not in accordance with international law and the Charter of the United Nations and that endanger food security”,

Recognizing the crucial role of agriculture in addressing the needs of the global populations and its links to eradicating poverty and the holistic development strategy of the SDGs 2030,

Emphasizing the urgent need to increase efforts at the national, regional and international level to address food security and agriculture development as part of
the international development agenda,

Having considered that high and volatile food prices and global food
the crisis poses a serious challenge to the fight against poverty and hunger based on the international corporation to track the SDGs 2030 while facing the world trade tariffs and barriers,

Stressing the important role of the United Nations and the interventions at the international level in order to maintain peace, justice and the prolonged agricultural development realm,

 

1.     Encourages the collaboration of the world agencies followed the main bodies of the United Nations in implementing the fair trade structure from the grassroots level to embracing the ongoing development in other underdeveloped and developing countries;
2.     Urges member states of all related main bodies especially the Economic and Social Council to actively comply with the international laws and using ODA to enhance the humanitarian assistance in complex emergencies due to events of wars on trade, tariffs, and embargoes on exports and imports;
3.     Calls for considering the establishment or scaling-up of food reserves at the community, national, and regional levels in order to facilitate accessible markets for all vulnerable and marginalized people;
4.     Stresses that investing in smallholders is to create economic opportunities supporting women, youth, refugees, and disadvantaged people worldwide for a durable, appropriate, sustainable and managed life of betterment; and
5.     Requests to implement free-market policies and open markets must be taken into account as a crucial bridge to narrow the rich and poor gap, and to relieve the detriments to status quos, and to raise production an incomes rather than trade-distorting subsidies which constrain development opportunities (Ash 2018, para. 10).

References

Ash, K 2018, OECD Solving the food crisis, viewed 29 September 2018, < http://www.oecd.org/agriculture/solving-the-food-crisis.htm&gt;

FAO 2002, Declaration of the World Food Summit: five years later, viewed 28 September 2018, < http://www.fao.org/worldfoodsummit/english/documents.htm&gt;

General Assembly of the United Nations 2017, Economic and Financial Committee Documentation for the 72nd session, viewed 28 September 2018, <http://undocs.org/A/72/303&gt;

United Nations 2018, The Universal Declaration of Human Rights 1948, viewed on 28 September 2018, < http://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/&gt;

United Nations 2018, About the Sustainable Development Goals, viewed 28 September 2018, < https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/sustainable-development-goals/&gt;

United Nations 2018, MDG Gap Task Force Report 2015, viewed 28 September 2018, <http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/pdf/MDG_Gap_2015_Executive_Summary_web.pdf&gt;

United Nations, United Nations Millennium Declaration 2000, viewed 28 September, <http://www.un.org/millennium/declaration/ares552e.htm&gt;