AAHM Asia crafts Road Map of Action for 2013-2015

Quezon City, Philippines – Recognizing that small food producers and the vulnerable sectors are among the most hungry and malnourished in the region, a CSO-led campaign in Asia vowed to fulfill its Road Map of Action from 2013- 2015 to promote food and nutrition security through smallholder agriculture.

NGOs and People’s movements of the Asian Alliance against Hunger and Malnutrition drew up the Road Map during their planning workshop last 06-07 December 2012 in Quezon City, Philippines. The Road Map basically upholds the right to food and nutrition as a basic human right, the important contribution of smallholder agriculture towards food and nutrition security, and the need to protect productive resources for food and agriculture.

It is in this context that for 2013-2015, AAHM-Asia shall implement three major programs, namely:

FARMER FIRST – which establishes a platform to advocate better policies in support of smallholder agriculture especially in relation to food and nutrition security;

FOOD SAVE – which enhances the Alliance’s capacity to promote consolidation and promotion of knowledge from smallholder farming, and;

FARM ED – which builds awareness and generates public support for smallholder agriculture, food and nutrition security.

To aid the alliance in developing a regional program, ANGOC asked the national alliances to prepare scoping studies on food and nutrition security through desk review, aimed to map the policies and programs of governments, determine mechanisms where such themes are discussed and propose action agenda for the alliance at national and regional levels. To date, the following countries have submitted the studies: Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Nepal, Pakistan, Philippines and Vietnam.

The Asian Alliance against Hunger and Malnutrition (AAHM-Asia) was convened after a regional workshop on food sovereignty organized jointly by the AAHM global office, the Asian NGO Coalition for Agrarian Reform and Rural Development (ANGOC) with the FAO Resident Country Office in Indonesia last 22-23 August 2011. The basis of coming together is the need to address the worsening problem of hunger and malnutrition in the region, and that there is a need to have an Asian unified “voice” to change the situation. #