None

The United Nations World Food Programme has started distributing food assistance to meet the immediate food needs of over 1.2 lakh people affected by rodent attack in Rangamati and Bandarban. The WFP will continue to assist 25,680 households of the 31 most affected unions of the seven severely affected upazilas for a period of four months, from May to August 2008, said a press release.

The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has started distributing food assistance to meet the immediate food needs of over 120,000 people affected by rodent attack in Rangamati and Bandarban districts. WFP will continue to assist 25,680 households of the 31 most affected unions of the seven severely affected upazilas for a period of four months, from May to August, 2008, said a press release.

Below, eight leaders in the fight against hunger offer up food crisis action plans, and long term ideas for how to end famine and bolster farming.

Every day, 25,000 people die from hunger-related causes. And when food accounts for more than half a poor family's spending, price rises can be truly devastating for millions living on the edge.

Myanmar's ruling junta has tightened access to the cyclone disaster zone in the country's south, frustrating aid groups trying to bring help to survivors, reporters and aid agencies said yesterday. Relief groups are furious over the regime's refusal to allow foreign experts into the country to mount a full-scale disaster response, and say they face even more constraints in bringing help to some two million survivors.

The United Nations said yesterday that only a tiny portion of international aid needed for Myanmar's cyclone victims is making it into the country, amid reports that the military regime is hoarding good-quality foreign aid for itself and doling out rotten food. The country's isolated military regime has agreed to accept relief shipments from the UN and foreign countries, but has largely refused entry to aidworkers who might distribute the aid.

RESIDENTS of Dhaka city, and others across the country, see daily lines of hundreds of people in fixed price shops in various neighbourhoods. Being lucky enough to still be insulated from food inflation, I ventured into one of the shops to obtain first hand information. Each outlet has 1,000 kgs of rice, the product most in demand, which are sold in a maximum of 5 kg parcels. The official claimed that there are almost 2,000 such shops in the country with an additional 2,000 more to be opened.

Spain plans to help five poor African countries fight hunger and climate change under a 60 million euro ($90 million) scheme to help the continent whose people flood to Spain in their tens of thousands each year. Spanish First Deputy Prime Minister Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega announced the aid package ahead of a Spanish-African women's conference opening on Monday in Niger, one of many African nations struggling to cope with high world food prices.

The global food crisis has brought on riots in about a dozen countries and left many panicked world leaders scrambling for answers. Alarming increases in once-affordable basic food staples such as rice, corn, and wheat have made millions more of the world's poor vulnerable to hunger and malnutrition. Past food market emergencies have been mainly regional in scope.

The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has appealed for urgent funds to sustain its operations in Sri Lanka in the wake of the rapid surge in commodity prices. The price of staple food such as rice has doubled over the year in Sri Lanka and in some countries tripled; reducing the volume of the commodities WFP can procure within the allocated budget by almost 50 per cent, a WFP news release said.

The United Nations estimated 1.5 million people have been "severely affected" by the cyclone that swept through Myanmar, with the United States expressing outrage on Thursday at delays in allowing in aid. In Myanmar, desperate survivors cried out for food, water and other supplies nearly a week after 100,000 people were feared killed by Cyclone Nargis as it swept across the farms and villages of the low-lying Irrawaddy delta region.

Pages