| UN official urges donors to release billions pledged for global food crisis |
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Jacques Diouf, director of the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization, and other delegates to an international meeting on food security warned that the global economic crisis must not cause countries to neglect the nearly billion people in the world that the U.N. says do not get enough to eat. The forum, organized by Spain and the United Nations, was designed to be a follow up to a 180-nation summit in Rome in June.Diouf said Monday that during and after that meeting, countries and international organizations pledged $22 billion in development aid to alleviate hunger. He did not say who pledged what or accuse any country of reneging, but simply called for swift release of the money. "The commitments made must lead to new resources very fast," Diouf said. Spain has promised $500 million in agricultural and food aid over the next four years and so far disbursed about half of that, Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos said. The soaring prices for staples like rice that triggered riots in the developing world last year have come down somewhat, but they remain high compared to levels prior to the crisis. The FAO's food price index in December was 28 percent above its 2005 level and 61 percent higher than in 2000, according to figures released at the conference. Josette Shearan, executive director of the World Food Program, said developing countries dependent on agriculture run the risk of getting left out as the world focuses on tumbling stock markets, flagging economic growth and failing banks. As people in developed countries fixate on Wall Street and Main Street, she told the conference, "we must not forget places with no streets." Shearan identified four effects the financial crisis is already having on the hunger crisis: remittances to poor countries like Haiti are down, nations that depend on exports of farm goods are suffering because of the economic slowdown in buyer countries, investment in agricultural infrastructure is declining and the credit crunch is particularly painful for small-scale farmers who need to borrow money for seeds and other supplies. The Madrid conference was being attended by ministers or other officials from 95 countries, as well as international organizations and NGOs. U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon was to address its closing session on Tuesday. As the meeting got away Monday, a small group of protesters demanding the eradication of world hunger chanted and banged pots outside the conference building. Some were dressed up in costumes depicting them as ears of corn.
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MADRID (AP) -- The United Nations urged donors Monday to release quickly billions of dollars in aid pledged at a food crisis summit last year after riots in developing countries over soaring prices. 
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