G8 summit tackles food supplies
Leaders of the G8 developed nations are reported to have agreed new efforts to boost food supplies to the hungry, on the final day of a summit in Italy.
The group has reportedly pledged to provide at least $15bn (£9.2bn) over three years to efforts to help poor nations develop their own agriculture.
AFP news agency quotes a G8 statement as saying there is "an urgent need for decisive action" on hunger and poverty.
On Thursday, the second day of talks, the summit focused on climate change.
Leaders from both developed and developing nations agreed that global temperatures should not rise more than 2C above 1900 levels.
That is the level above which, the UN says, the Earth's climate system would become dangerously unstable.
On Friday, attention at the summit in the Italian city of L'Aquila turned to the issue of food security.
BBC economics correspondent Andrew Walker says the idea is to put more emphasis on helping people feed themselves.
That is to be achieved with more investment in the agriculture of developing countries, and the G8 nations - Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia and the US - are expected to pledge significant resources, our correspondent adds.
However, although the total amount of overseas development aid (ODA) was increased in 2008, the rich countries are still behind on their target to double aid that was made at the G8 Gleneagles Summit in 2005 - and Italy is among the laggards.
Not all the $15bn reportedly pledged to the agriculture initiative will be new funding.
Kanaya Nwanze, president of the International Fund for Agricultural Development, told the BBC that he welcomed the announcement of more investment in agriculture in the developing world.
"It is time for us to switch because food security is not just food aid," he said.
"It is the ability of people to produce food locally and for them to be able to have access to local markets."
Mr Nwanze said he expected US President Barack Obama to call for support on Friday from the G8 and other emerging economies for the agriculture initiative.
The US is reportedly planning to contribute some $3.5bn to the programme.
Mr Obama was to meet representatives of Angola, Algeria, Nigeria and Senegal in L'Aquila, before meeting Pope Benedict XVI in Rome and embarking on an African tour later on Friday.
Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, who is also attending Friday's talks in L'Aquila, told Reuters news agency that the key message from African nations was that the G8 had to live up to its commitments.
Aid organisations have criticised some members for failing to deliver on the promise made at the 2005 G8 summit to increase annual aid levels to sub-Saharan Africa by $25bn by 2010.
Italy, the present summit host, has come under particular pressure for cutting, rather than increasing, aid this year.
Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has said the global economic crisis and Italy's mounting debts are responsible for a delay in Rome meeting its promises.
Climate challenge
On Thursday, Mr Obama said the G8 and developing nations had made important strides in dealing with climate change.
But the G8 failed to persuade the developing countries to accept targets of cutting emissions by 50% by 2050.
On Wednesday, the G8 agreed its own members would work towards 80% cuts by the same date.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said the G8 had not done enough and should also set 2020 targets for emissions cuts.
BBC environment analyst Roger Harrabin says the declaration is a significant step, with all big countries - rich and poor - agreeing there is a scientific limit on the amount we can warm the climate.
But there is still a huge way to go, he says, as developing nations like India will not sign up to any 2050 targets unless rich nations show more determination and offer more cash.
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