Regional News of Tuesday, 16 June 2015

Source: GNA

One out of four suffers severe hunger

Ms Hannah Bissiw, a Deputy Minister of Agriculture, has said that one out of every four persons in Sub Saharan Africa suffers from severe malnutrition.

Hence the need for concerted efforts by all leaders and stakeholders in the Sub region to work to ensure that enough food was produced to end hunger in the area.

Ms Bissiw said this over the weekend during the launch of the 2015 Food for All Ghana Campaign and Conference, aimed at ensuring that the less privileged in society have access to food.

She said the Government was working to ensure that Ghana achieved the MDG one, which aims at halving poverty and hunger by the end of 2015.

She called for an end to post harvest loses, which was one of the main reasons for food wastage in Ghana and across Africa.

Mr Elijah Addo, the Founder, Food for All Ghana campaign, said the campaign and the 2015 conference slated for October 13 to 16, was aimed at ensuring that the less privileged, such as the physically challenged and the poor, had access to food.

It was also aimed at putting a stop to food wastage in homes, hotels, among others, he said.

He noted that currently more than 45 per cent of food produced and imported in Ghana was wasted along the food supply chain.

“Meanwhile over 30 per cent of Ghanaians can’t afford decent and healthy food in a day and if left unchecked, Ghana would be losing over $50 billion per annum by 2018,”he said.

The conference would be under the theme, “Waste Not, Want Not, Building West Africa’s First Food Recovery Bank”.