U.N. MAPS HUNGER IN WORLD
Africa Is First in Structural Poverty

NEW YORK, JAN. 10, 2001 (ZENIT.org).- It is no news that there is
hunger in the world, but the fact that the same part of the world
continues to suffer spells defeat, states a report of the U.N. World
Food Program, mapping out hunger in the world for the first time.

The warm areas of the world are in the red and, within this color,
Africa continues to have the darkest hue. This continent also
occupies first place in regard to AIDS, wars that have broken out
over the past 5 years, drought, and hunger and its consequent
illnesses.

"We've seen an alarming trend, where the poorest nations are hit
simultaneously both by natural and man-made emergencies, including
Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Indonesia, Afghanistan, Sierra Leone,
Guinea, and Tajikistan," the head of the Rome-based agency, Ms.
Bertini, said.

The report shocks the reader with a most eloquent fact: more than one
person out of 7 in the world runs the risk of dying of hunger.

"War and drought continue to be the major factors that force people
to leave their own homes, harvests, and sources of subsistence, while
internal conflicts, social clashes, and natural disasters continue to
be the principal sources of food insecurity," Bertini explained.

The areas in greatest risk continue to be the same: Africa, Asia, and
Latin America. "We are witnessing an alarming tendency, which proves
that already poor nations sustain the additional weight of the
coincidence of natural disasters and those caused by man. I am
referring to Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Indonesia, Afghanistan, Sierra
Leone, Guinea Bissau, and Tajikistan."

Unfortunately, the situation does not seem to have a chance of
improvement in 2001, Bertini reported. The World Food Program
provided food for 89 million people in more than 80 nations last
year. Some 16 million of them were in the Horn of Africa, where the
agency sought to prevent a repeat of the 1983-84 famine.

Bertini's map, illustrating pockets of hunger according to a nation's
population, showed African nations as the hardest hit. One of every
three persons in the region lacks sufficient food, often due to a
combination of war and drought.

The countries include Ethiopia, Eritrea, Angola, Burundi, Sierra
Leone, Guinea, and Somalia. In addition, millions of drought-affected
people live in Tajikistan, Pakistan, Iran, Armenia, and Georgia, as
well as Afghanistan, North Korea, Mongolia, Cambodia, and Bangladesh.

The map also showed that 11% of the population of 481 million in
Latin America and the Caribbean suffered from undernourishment,
lacking food to provide basic nutrients. The countries affected
include Haiti, Nicaragua, Bolivia, and Honduras.

Bertini said donors responded quickly to hunger alerts in Ethiopia
and Eritrea last year. However, far less help went to Iraq, where the
programs for children age 5 and under were never fully funded, she
denounced.

Most of Baghdad's food supplies are bought by the government with
revenues from oil sales under the U.N.-supervised "oil-for-food"
program.

However, U.N. officials said that Iraqi people lack so many other
goods that they are selling their food rations for items such as
clothing.
ZE010011002
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I have not been able to locate an online version of this. If anyone does please let me know. I think others might be interested in it.


Peace,

John Freund, C.M.