World Food Day - October 16th, 2009
Director Generals Comment on World Food Day
 Indications of the recent economic crises were apparent well in advance to those who knew how to read the signs. Similarly, signs of a coming food crisis are emerging from a number of quarters.
Our focus here at the International Water Management Institute is to help ensure there is sufficient water to grow enough food of an expanding population. This will not easy. Growing cities, demand for biofuel crops and water-hungry foods in the form of meat and dairy products are some of the forces competing for the use of a finite supply of water. And with each passing month it seems we see more evidence of how global warming is altering the hydrological cycle, the lifeblood of our planet. Large parts of Australia, the Mediterranean and the southwest United States are some of the regions already feeling the effects.
Technology will provide some of the solutions, but we will not breed our way out of this problem with new crop varieties. Even drought resistant crops need some water. What we can do right now and for relatively little cost is apply more productive ways of managing water. There is no lack of proven technologies here.
One of the most difficult issues of the coming decades will be equitable water allocation in transboundary basins to ensure smallholder farmers and the poor get their fair share. For several decades now IWMI has been working to develop the management and policy tools we need to make this happen. As with the technology, we are not lacking in potential solutions. What we continue to overlook are the opportunities for integrative solutions. We have people doing research and development on seeds, on irrigation and water systems, on livestock and a score of other disciplines. None of these alone are a solution.
The future belongs to those who can integrate solutions and manage change on a landscape scale, ensuring that the poor do not get left behind. At IWMI, we know we cannot do this alone. We will need to work with old and new partners in national agricultural extension services, private and public research institutions and our partner institutions in the CGIAR and other networks.
The critical factor is funding. Without sufficient funding, research for development will not be able to provide the integrative solutions we need to avert ever more serious food crises, which, as always, affect the poor most and hardest. We are fond of justifying our efforts in the name of the poor. We should keep in mind that while they are the first to suffer, they are not the last. The sooner we heed the signs of the coming food crisis, the less suffering there will be all around.
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