By Robin Pomeroy and Stephen Brown
ROME (Reuters) - Soaring food prices could trigger a globalcatastrophe and the world's poor need action, not words, fromthis week's U.N. food security summit, human rights activistsand the World Bank said on Monday.
The warning came as world leaders arrived in Rome for aglobal conference to tackle a food crisis that is pushing 100million people into hunger, provoking food protests and couldaggravate violence in war zones.
"The current food crisis amounts to a gross violation ofhuman rights and could fuel a global catastrophe, as many ofthe world's poorest countries, particularly those forced intoimport dependency, struggle to feed their people," saidJohannesburg-based poverty campaign group ActionAid.
"It is an outrage that poor people are paying for decadesof policy mistakes such as the lack of investment inagriculture and the dismantling of support for smallholderfarmers," said ActionAid analyst Magdalena Kropiwnicka.
Poor harvests, low stocks and rising demand, especiallyfrom India and China, caused huge food price spikes over thelast two years, stoking protests, strikes and violence inAfrica, Latin America and Asia.
The International Committee of the Red Cross has warnedthat increased hunger caused by the price spikes willexacerbate conflict in war zones and experts say food riotscould worsen if nothing is done.
"Our estimate is that higher food prices are pushing 30million Africans into hunger," World Bank chief Robert Zoellicktold Reuters in Rome, adding that the message he had receivedfrom Africans is that they were tired of talk and wantedaction.
"We have got a lot of world leaders here, let's try tofocus on what we can do in real time to make a difference,"said Zoellick, who last week announced $1.2 billion in loansand grants to help poor countries cope with food and fuelcosts.
He said immediate action was needed to deliver aid to thecountries most at risk, send poor farmers seeds and fertilisersand lift export bans driving up prices.
MUGABE, AHMADINEJAD STEAL LIMELIGHT
Forty-four heads of state and government are expected atthe three-day meeting, which kicks off a round of diplomatictalks on poverty, hunger and development in the coming months,including a G8 Summit, a U.N. General Assembly and potentiallyconclusive talks on new world trade rules.
Japan's Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda said the summit shouldissue a "forceful message on medium- to long-term measures suchas increasing food production and agriculture productivity."
But the hunger discussions are in danger of beingovershadowed by the presence of Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe andIran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who both have strained relationswith the West.
The European Union has a travel ban on Mugabe, but thatdoes not apply to U.N. meetings.
Britain and Australia called Mugabe's presence at thesummit obscene, while the World Jewish Congress said it wasdeplorable that Ahmadinejad "is allowed to hijack the agenda ofthis important FAO conference."
Hunger campaigners have targeted the recent rise inbio-fuels -- usually the conversion of food crops into energy-- as one of the main culprits for the price rise and say thesummit should declare a ban on arable land being switched tobiofuel production.
"To continue the pursuit of biofuels in the face of thecredible, impartial and growing opinion that this isexacerbating the food crisis is morally outrageous and utterlyindefensible," said Rob Bailey, of hunger campaigners Oxfam.
Under U.S. plans, about a quarter of the U.S. corn cropwill be channelled into ethanol production by 2022 as analternative to crude oil.
U.S. Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer played down theimpact of biofuels on food pricing, saying they onlycontributed 2-3 percent of overall price rise. Oxfam says thereal figure is closer to 30 percent.
Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, president of Brazil, a pioneerin sugar-cane based biofuels, said he would use the summit todefend biofuels.
"It's up to Brazil, a centre of excellence in ethanolproduction, to prove that it's fully possible to make ethanoloutput compatible with the production of food."
(Additional reporting by Phil Stewart and Silvia Aloisi,editing by Ralph Boulton and Jon Boyle)
