Accra, Dec. 5, GNA - Dr Jacques Diouf, Director-General of the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), on Tuesday commended the Government for the appreciable strides made in meeting the food requirements of Ghanaians.

He said Ghana was among the first to reach and surpass the World Food Summit goal of reducing by half the number of undernourished people by 2015.

Between 1990-92 and 2001-03, the number of hungry people fell from 5.8 million to 2.4 million.

Dr Diouf, who was briefing the press in Accra, however, said more attention was required in the area of nutrition for children less than five years of age.

He lauded the School Feeding Programme launched by the Government under which millions of school children are provided with one hot meal a day, and expressed optimism that it would help to address the nutrition needs of children.

Dr Diouf and his two counterparts, Dr Lennart Bage, President of International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) and Mr James Morris, Executive Director of World Food Programme (WFP), are in the country to assess the impact of their interventions.

Dr Diouf said he and his counterparts were in Ghana not by chance but in acknowledgement of the strides the country was making on all fronts, including socio-economic development and good governance. Mr Lennart Bage, President of IFAD, called for increased investment in agriculture and rural development to boost the standard of living for poor rural women; children and men.

So far IFAD has invested about 950 million dollars in its programme in the development of root crops and tubers and to improve value addition.

Dr Bage said all agencies were determined to work as a coherent system to get synergies to work. He expressed satisfaction with how funds provided by IFAD for its programmes were being utilized in the rural areas, especially in the three northern regions.

The three Rome-based organizations are collaborating to provide support to the Ghana School Feeding Programme to improve nutrition and education using food produced locally from school and family gardens and smallholder farmers.

The Director General said 290,000 children were being targeted under the WHO/NEPAD feeding programme.

Other areas of assistance include policy initiatives in medium-term investment programme, aquaculture and food security. Mr Enerst Debrah, Minister of Food and Agriculture, said the Government was rehabilitating old dams while new ones were being built to facilitate improved agricultural performance. Besides more agriculture equipment such as tractors; slashers; power tillers had been imported to reduce the drudgery the farmers go through while tilling the land, he said.