But the lack of attendance by all G8 country leaders – except Italy, where the three-day summit was held – did not bode well for increasing investment, donations and food aid to where they are needed most.

“I would have liked all countries to be represented by their heads of state or government,” Diouf said, as cameras flashed and reporters scribbled notes, held up microphones and sent text messages. “The funding of agriculture isn’t decided by ministries of agriculture.”

Diouf also expressed frustration that the summit declaration, the product of several round-table discussions and meetings attended by 60 heads of state and more than 2,000 delegates, did not list specific target dates or financial sums for dealing with the increasing number of hungry people in the world.

The declaration did reaffirm the delegates’ commitment to the already-agreed-upon Millenium Development Goal of halving the world’s hungry population by 2015.

International humanitarian organizations Oxfam and ActionAid were quick to release statements condemning the lack of commitment or substantial accomplishments achieved during the summit.

“The World Food Summit failed to make any major breakthroughs. And the G8 leaders didn’t even bother turning up,” said Adriana Campolina, ActionAid regional director for Latin America. “Warm words don’t fill empty stomachs.”

Alternating between French and English during the final press conference, Diouf stressed the importance of looking at long-term structural factors when dealing with food insecurity. Some of the factors included foreign direct investment, technology and climate change.

The summit declaration also called for more attention to climate change, requesting that countries “proactively….increase the resilience of agricultural producers to climate change, with particular attention to small agricultural producers and vulnerable populations.”

Diouf called Sub-Saharan Africa a challenge and said that it was a “great human tragedy” that this region housed the largest percentage of hungry people in the world.

Climate change, he said, made it even more difficult to find solutions to food insecurity, specifically noting the drought in the Horn of Africa and its effect on Djibouti, Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Kenya and other countries.

When asked what aspect of food insecurity he would want to focus on in Africa, Diouf chose water as a top priority. He called increasing small-scale irrigation projects, controlling water-sheds and freeing up funds for water projects vital to the future of agriculture on the continent.

In conclusion, Diouf appealed to the media to make “an important effort” to bring attention to the more than 1 billion hungry members of the population, warning that otherwise, the world may “forget completely.”

Day 3, 5:28 p.m.: While there were plenty of critics who called the U.N. World Summit on Food Security fruitless, not everyone felt the conference was a failure, as some have described it.

We had the privilege of sharing a press table with Fath el-Rahman al-Gadi, a Sudanese journalist who, after filing his own reports for the newspaper he represented, shared his thoughts with me on the conference.

After one of my colleagues showed him our site and helped him with a minor computer glitch, I asked him for his initial thoughts. He said the efforts by the Food and Agriculture Organization, the World Food Program, and private and civil society organizations set a “new trend in humanity” for fighting hunger.

Al-Gadi said he had one disappointment, however. Although delegates from 192 countries were represented at the conference, he said, only one country from the Group of Eight–Italy, the host country–was present.

“We felt sorry for that,” he said, “because we would have liked to witness the active presence of the European countries as well as the U.S. of A.”

“With south-to-north collaborations we can build a future,” he added. “Of course, the rich countries can make a significant contribution through funding and through the transferring of technology know-how. But I hope that in the future this trend of absenteeism will no longer exist.”

I also asked al-Gadi to describe what he felt was the most important food security story in Sudan right now. At the moment, he said, the focus is on the country’s rich natural resources, especially those related to land, water and soil. With these resources, he said, Sudan has the potential to compete in world markets provided that the projects concerning food insecurity are sponsored by collaborative efforts between Sudan and the international communities.

Check back later for more updates from Shalwah and Alexia on the final moments of the conference.

–Martin Ricard

As a reporter my job is to take complicated issues and frame them so that they make sense to the average person—or so I thought. But by the end of this World Summit on Food Security, I too am confused about this behemoth of an issue. I’ve collected all the papers. I’ve read the documents. I’ve listened to the statements made by delegates from various countries. And I still wonder: has anything come from this summit, funded by the Saudis for $2.5 million.

I am unsure how to appease the reader when it comes to the huge multi-faceted issue at the end of a summit that essentially has not reached a solution.

Jacques Diouf, director-general of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, said that he “believes that we have agreed on important things.” And although he concedes that a summit cannot solve the problems, but only actions of the leaders who have made promises can do that, he said that some progress has been made.

I think about this as I reflect on this experience. During a short break between the conclusion of the summit and Diouf’s press conference I went to lunch across the street with some colleagues. We settled at an outside table of a nice restaurant with mid-range prices; about seven euros for a margherita pizza. After a miscommunication about a plate of tortellini ensued my colleagues and I left only paying for what we thought was fair, leaving a cold plate of tortellini on the table—almost completely untouched. I ordered tortellini with cream sauce, as described and pictured on the menu not expecting it to have small pieces of ham sprinkled on top. I don’t eat ham for religious reasons, and asked that the food be taken back.

I couldn’t even begin to figure out the value of that plate of tortellini in the larger scheme of food and agriculture, but I know I felt guilty as I replayed in my head the words of African visitors attending the summit. Most of them were from NGOs in developing countries, hoping for the chance to be heard by UN leaders regarding the lack of access to food in their countries. Here I was leaving food on a table, because of a religious restriction nonetheless, but interviewing people who have seen famine and drought in their homes.

Particularly I thought about Aichatori Sami from Niger. I met her at the Food Sovereignty Forum’s events on the first day of the summit. In a park across the street from the FAO building, surrounded by police officers, she gathered with other NGO leaders to discuss what absolutely needs to be done to end hunger. She spoke softly, with no malice in her voice.

“I am with the regional Peasants Platform from Niger and we are part of La Via Campesina, which is an umbrella organization,” she said. “We are very proud to come to this forum. We have great hope that our governments may be able to insist, and to press upon FAO so that they can really implement the concept of food sovereignty—which to me means being able to be fed, to eat as much as you need to. And when I say eat I mean good quality food.

“As I see it, during the last years, efforts for food security are still too weak. There has been a decline in the percentage of food aid to developing countries. I think that our governments should stand up and pressure the people at UNICEF, FAO and other institutions so that they really do the things discussed here this week.”

At the press conference most reporters touched on similar subjects. This summit failed, these talks led to nothing. The sentiment was skepticism. After previous meetings like this, nothing has happened. So people like Sami, and reporters, are understandably wary of believing that anything will change this time. If effective fights against hunger failed to materialize from previous events like this why should we believe. As of right now the summit has just ended. And whether or not promises will be kept is to be seen. And it is the hope of people like Aichatori Sami that this summit won’t be added to the list of examples of failed talks. And as human being with a heart, and a reporter who sees the passion of both sides—the intent of the UN leaders and doubt of the hungry people—it’s my hope as well.

ROME — The Food and Agriculture Organization building was humming with low-level, languid activity Sunday afternoon, as journalists and FAO officials prepared for Monday’s launch of the World Food Summit on Food Security.

Journalists speaking a myriad of languages checked e-mail, made phone calls, joked and lounged around the blue-carpeted media room, awaiting the event and the resulting news coverage blitz. The conference, which will begin with an address by Pope Benedict XVI, stretches over the next three days.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon and FAO Director-General Jacques Diouf are also on the speaker line-up. Over 60 heads of state are expected to attend.

“You see this? Remember this,” FAO employee Maria Folch said, waving her arm at the relaxed journalists, the barely half-filled room. “It won’t look like this tomorrow.”

A connected event, the First Ladies Summit on Food Security and Women’s Access to Resources commenced today, but media were not allowed into the closed afternoon session.

Suzanne Mubarak, the first lady of Egypt, is presiding over this summit. (Full name: ‘The Second First Ladies Summit of the Non-Aligned Movement on Food Security and Women’s Access to Resources.’)

Their concept paper affirms that the primary victims of the food crisis are female-headed households and the urban poor. “Women produce 60-80 percent of the food in most of the developing countries,” it states. Some factors restricting women’s relationship to food production: lack of access to land, financial credit, education, training and research and technology.

Their suggestions? More direct investments in projects aimed at helping rural women and more emphasis on gender equality, among other things.

Despite the quiet pre-conference mood, the confusion that ensues when several international heads of state, NGOs and one pope converge on a single building was in full force.

The closest metro station (Circo Massimo) was locked down, streets were blocked off and police and security clumped together in small groups along Viale delle Terme di Caracalla.

This journalist was mistakenly ushered in through the main doors (frantic calls of ‘Signiora…Signiora!’ finally halted my wayward journey) and I was eventually sent back to the media entrance, a half-block away, next to some dumpsters and a petrol station.

Well-dressed international delegates wandered near the stately silver FAO building on the same street, enjoying the mild weather. None paid much attention to the remains of the historic Roman Circus Maximus, which served as an astonishing backdrop to the low-key bustle and pomp.

Right now, there’s little to do but wait. Tomorrow, it will be a different story.