Acta Apostolicae Sedis - Commentarium Officiale846

NUNTII

I

Internationali adveniente Die Alimoniae dicato, anno 2010.

To Mr Jacques Diouf

Director General of the Food and Agriculture Organization

of the United Nations (FAO)

1. The annual celebration of World Food Day is an occasion to draw up a

balance-sheet of all that has been achieved through the commitment of the

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) to guaran-

tee daily food for millions of our brothers and sisters throughout the world. It

also provides a suitable occasion to note the difficulties that are encountered

when the necessary attitudes of solidarity are lacking.

Too often, attention is diverted from the needs of populations, insufficient

emphasis is placed on work in the fields, and the goods of the earth are not

given adequate protection. As a result, economic imbalance is produced, and

the inalienable rights and dignity of every human person are ignored.

The theme of this year's World Food Day, United against Hunger, is a

timely reminder that everyone needs to make a commitment to give the

agricultural sector its proper importance. Everyone - from individuals to

the organizations of civil society, States and international institutions -

needs to give priority to one of the most urgent goals for the human family:

freedom from hunger. In order to achieve freedom from hunger it is necessary

to ensure not only that enough food is available, but also that everyone has

daily access to it: this means promoting whatever resources and infrastruc-

tures are necessary in order to sustain production and distribution on a scale

sufficient to guarantee fully the right to food.

The efforts to achieve this goal will surely help to build up the unity of the

human family throughout the world. Concrete initiatives are needed,

informed by charity, and inspired by truth - initiatives that are capable

of overcoming natural obstacles linked to the cycles of the seasons or

to environmental conditions, as well as man-made obstacles. Charity,

practised in the light of truth, can bring an end to divisions and conflicts