The UAE Ministry of Economy (MoE) officials met with representatives from the World Food Programme (UNWFP), the United Nations frontline agency in the fight against global hunger.

The two parties discussed the regional and global impact of rising food prices.

Deputy executive director of the External Affairs and Resource Development Department of the UNWFP John M Powell praised UAE’s efforts to keep food prices low, and presented Sultan bin Saeed Al Mansour Al Mansouri with a prize in recognition of MoE’s efforts in this regard.

Under the leadership of Al Mansouri, the ministry has been aggressively implementing several strategies to manage prices of basic commodities; last month the MoE signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Union Cooperative Society to retain the 2007 prices of 16 basic food items.

The ministry also recently signed an MoU with Lulu Hypermarket Group to fix the prices of 32 basic commodities.

“The MoE can benefit from the UNWFP’s experience, so we offer our full cooperation to achieve what is good for the UAE and for other nations involved in the program; as long as there is balanced cooperation from all concerned parties.  We will do our best to solve the issue of the rising cost of food at the soonest; which is an issue that is affecting many global markets and thus needs the full cooperation of worldwide governments and organisations,” said Al Mansouri.

The meeting comes only weeks after the WFP executive director Josette Sheeran, sent a letter to 20 heads of state, calling on them to make an emergency allocation to the organisation’s newly created special account, to offset the rising costs associated with procuring and delivering food.

The WFP aims to feed 73 million people in 78 countries throughout 2008, at a cost of around $3.4 billion. 

Rising food prices worldwide are predominantly attributed to the rise in oil and energy prices; the economic boom that is increasing food demand; weather-related events and bad harvests; and competition between food and fuel. – TradeArabia News Service