The U.S. Grains Council (USGC) and the U.S. Department
of Agriculture’s Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS) sponsored a Global Food Security Symposium in Tokyo on 7 April.

U.S. and Japanese leaders in government, agribusiness, economics, and biotechnology gathered to discuss strategies for feeding a growing global population in which one of the critical issues is food availability.

The U.S, Grains Council is a private, non-profit organization dedicated to creating markets for U.S. corn, barley, sorghum and their related products.

The symposium, which was part of a week-long “Partners in Agriculture” series of events in Tokyo between U.S. and Japanese agricultural experts, discussed public and private initiatives worldwide to use technology and strategic policies to achieve food production goals for a fast-growing world population.

U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack (right) shares platform with The Nippon Foundation Chairman Yohei Sasakawa at the Global Food Security Symposium in Tokyo

USGC President and CEO Thomas C. Dorr told the symposium, “Some of the world’s finest minds gathered together today to discuss how to leverage past successes in international agricultural cooperative programs between the U.S. and Japan, plus today’s emerging technologies, to provide proper nutrition and economic strength and stability for our world’s growing population.”

USGC Chairman Rick Fruth, an Ohio grains producer, moderated a panel discussion by noted agricultural industry and academic experts which focused on the topic, “Feeding a Growing World.”

Fruth said, “Crop producers are hungry for the technology that will allow us to help feed the world’s growing population. The dialogue we created today lay the foundation for achieving that goal through a combination of the right policy and the strategic application of technology.”

U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, who was in Tokyo to promote stronger agricultural ties between the United States and Japan, told the symposium, “Last year’s economic woes caused a dramatic increase in the number of people around the world who do not have enough to eat.

“Estimates from the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization suggest that in 2009, for the first time ever, more than 1 billion people around the world were chronically hungry. And throughout the developing world, a child dies every six seconds from malnutrition and related causes.

“Food insecurity is first and foremost a moral issue. We should all feel a humanitarian imperative to take on the challenge and ensure that children do not go to sleep hungry. But it goes beyond that.

“No matter where they live, children will only realize their full potential if they have regular access to food. Giving a child the opportunity for a brighter, more productive future, affects not only the individual child, but the community where that child is raised, the country where he or she lives, and all of the world.

“Working to eliminate food insecurity across the globe will provide incredible economic benefits to developing and developed countries alike. It will increase political stability in conflict and poverty-stricken regions, and put these countries on a path to future prosperity.”

Vilsack said a commitment to work on these issues is imperative because the world population is growing by 79 million people each year, the equivalent of 6 Tokyos.

Future food demand is expected to increase by 70 percent as of 2050 – challenging the world to grow and raise enough food, but there are threats to agricultural productivity such as scarce water supplies, and competition for energy resources from industry and urbanization.

“Climate change also promises to have an outsized impact on the global food supply. Variations in temperature, increased frequency of extreme weather like drought, floods and storms, and the spread of pests and diseases to new geographic areas will likely impact productivity.

“These challenges are sobering reminders of why food security must remain at the core of the international agenda. And, they point to a future where investing in agricultural development is the only way to find a permanent solution to hunger,” Vilsack stressed.

“In short, a critical step towards global food security will be achieving a more efficient global market that is based on established international rules that reduce barriers, reduce costs, and increase reliability of trading systems,” he said.

He added, “In the months and years ahead, it is incumbent on both the United States and Japan to work together to tackle the food security crisis. Helping countries through broad-based agricultural growth makes moral and economic sense.”

At the conclusion of the symposium, The World Food Prize was presented to Mr Yohei Sasakawa and The Nippon Foundation in honor of Ryoichi Sasakawa.

The prize was presented in recognition of the sustained joint efforts of the late Ryoichi Sasakawa and Dr Norman E. Borlaug for their efforts to bring the “Green Revolution” to Africa.

This cooperation between Borlaug and Sasakawa has been credited with saving the lives of millions of people, and their work will no doubt be the model for the kind of agricultural development needed to feed the world in the coming years.