More than recognition, the award of the Nobel Peace Prize to the World Food Program (WFP) represents a call to action to meet the needs of the almost 300 million people in the world who urgently need food, said the executive director of the humanitarian agency, David Beasley, in his speech accepting the award on Thursday.
“Today I would like to be able to talk about how by working together we could end world hunger for the 690 million people who go to bed hungry every night. But today we are facing a crisis, "he warned.
“Because of so many wars, climate change, the widespread use of hunger as a political and military weapon, and an exponentially worsening global health pandemic, 270 million people are walking towards starvation. If their needs are not met, a hunger pandemic will ensue that will dwarf the impact of COVID-19"He said.
Millions of people one step away from famine
After recalling the famine that killed 90% of the population of Rome in 400 and wondering if this was the cause of the collapse of the Roman Empire, he pointed out that it is difficult to imagine waking up in a "rich, modern and technologically advanced" world and being going through a similar famine.
“But my tragic duty today is to tell you: the famine is knocking at the doors of humanity. For millions and millions of people on Earth. If it is not avoided, many lives will be destroyed and it will cause the disappearance of many things that we cherish, ”he warned.
Beasley explained that the success of the World Food Program is based on two axes: that food is sacred and that its performance is an act of love. Regarding this last point, he recalled that Dr. Martin Luther King, Nobel Peace Prize in 1964, said that "love is the most enduring force in the world."
"Food is sacred. Anyone who attends a Thanksgiving or holiday meal, or has taken Communion, attended a Seder, fasted during Ramadan or made a food offering in a Buddhist temple knows this, "he said.
$ 5000 billion to save 30 million people
However, he highlighted the paradox that represents, on the one hand, having made great strides over a century in eliminating extreme poverty and now finding itself with 270 million people on the brink of starvation; and, on the other hand, that world wealth amounts to 400 trillion dollars.
“Even at the height of the COVID pandemic, in just 90 days, an extra profit of $ 2,7 trillion was generated. And we only need $ 5000 billion to save 30 million people from famine", he pointed.
After confessing that many friends and leaders around the planet tell him that he has the best job in the world, since it allows him to save millions of lives, he revealed the answer he gives them.
«At night I don't go to bed thinking about the children we saved, I go to bed crying for the children we couldn't save. And when we don't have enough money, or the access we need, we have to decide which children eat and which children don't eat, which children live, which children die. How would you like to do that job? ”He revealed.
Beasley asked everyone not to make him choose between who lives and who dies and, invoking the spirit of the prize's founder, Alfred Nobel, asked for food for everyone.
"Food is the path that leads to peace," he concluded.
On October 9, the Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded the award to the World Food Program “for its efforts in the fight against hunger, for its contribution to the improvement of peace conditions in conflict-affected areas and for its performance as a driving force in preventing the use of hunger as a weapon of war and conflict ”.