The United Nations is calling for a radical redistribution of the billions in global aid in agriculture. According to a study presented on Tuesday, 87 percent of agricultural subsidies distort competition and harm the environment or small businesses. The UN report calculates that 470 billion dollars (almost 400 billion euros) of the total annual flow of 540 billion dollars (457 billion euros) would have to be used differently in order to be sustainable and fair. This was commissioned by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the Development Program (UNDP), among others.
The study is "a wake-up call for governments around the world," said FAO Director General Qu Dongyu.
The head of the UN Environment Program (UNEP), Inger Andersen, urged states to seize the opportunity "to make agriculture a main driver of human well-being and a solution to the threats posed by climate change, the loss of nature and environmental pollution" .
In their study, the authors sound the alarm: The current aid is mostly distributed via customs duties or subsidies that are linked to the manufacture and cultivation of certain goods.
This is inefficient, falsifies prices, is harmful to health, destroys the environment and leads to inequality of opportunity.
Large agricultural corporations would be preferred to small farms, in which women often work.
The consequences are dramatic: in 2020, 811 million people worldwide were suffering from malnutrition, and almost every third person in the world did not have regular access to adequate nutrition.
Redistributing the aid money could help billions of people.
It's not just about nutrition.
Agriculture is one of the main causes of climate change - but farmers and agricultural producers in particular suffer most from the consequences of the crisis, such as extreme heat, droughts or floods.
The climate goals of the Paris Agreement cannot be achieved with the current type of subsidization.
Wealthy countries should reform their support for the meat and dairy industries, poorer countries should change their financial aid for toxic pesticides and fertilizers and the cultivation of monocultures.