Pope Francis says addressing war and the climate change are "prerequisites" for ending global hunger
Pope Francis seemed to take a jab at the United States and
President Donald Trump, while speaking at the United Nations Food and
Agriculture Organization's Rome headquarters for World Food Day.
The pope called on the global community to work together to
solve the related issues of hunger, climate change, and the refugee crisis.
"We see consequences of climate change every day,"
he said. "Thanks to scientific knowledge,
we know how we have to confront the problem and the international community has
also worked out the legal methods, such as the Paris Accord, which sadly, some have abandoned," he
added, with an apparent reference to the Trump administration's commitment
to withdrawing from the 2015 agreement.
"We are called to propose a change in lifestyle and the use of resources," he said. "We can't be satisfied by saying 'someone else will do it.'"
Pope Francis condemned "negligence toward the delicate
equilibriums of the ecosystems, the presumption of manipulating and controlling
the limited resources of the planet, and the greed for profit."
"The yoke of poverty caused by the often tragic movement of
migrants can be removed by prevention," he declared, "consisting of
development projects that create jobs and offer the capacity to respond to
climactic and environmental changes."
He specifically emphasized that ending armed conflicts and
limiting the effects of climate change are "prerequisites" for
addressing global hunger. His comments align with a U.N. report published last
month that found worldwide hunger, fueled by
conflict and climate change, is on the rise for the first time in more than a
decade.
The report found that in 2016, malnutrition and food insecurity
affected 815 million people, or 11 percent of the global population, up from
777 million the previous year. It also raised concerns that the global
community will fail to reach the U.N. sustainable development goal of eradicating world hunger by 2030.
"The biggest problem we have today is war, man-made
conflict," said David Beasley, executive director of the World Food
Programme (WFP). "Eighty percent of the expenditure of WFP—over 6 billion
dollars—is in man-made conflict zones like Syria, like Iraq, like Somalia....
We will never achieve Zero Hunger by 2030 until we end conflict."
Madagascar president Hery Martial Rakotoarimanana
Rajaonarimampianina, whose nation is facing the impacts of climate change, also
spoke at the event Monday.
"Young men and women are the most affected by (climate
change-related) population displacements," he said. "If we want to
change the paradigm of migration, we need to find solutions in the countries of
origin."
"More and more people migrate because they do not have the
option to remain in their homes and lands," said FAO Director-General José
Graziano da Silva, who also lamented the root causes of migration too
often ignored.
"How do you stop people who are ready to risk everything,
entire generations that can disappear for lack of their daily bread, or because
they are the victims of violence or climate change?" the pope posed in his
speech.
"They go where they see light, or sense a hope of life.
They cannot be stopped by physical, economic, legal, or ideological barriers:
only a coherent application of the principle of humanity can do that," he
said, perhaps referencing attempts by
Trump and European leaders to enact stricter refugee
rules, and even a wall along the southern U.S. border.
"The organization of human mobility demands coordinated and
systematic intergovernmental action," he concluded, "based on
existing international norms and permeated with love and intelligence."