G8 leaders pledged $20 billion in farm aid in Italy today to help poor nations, surpassing expectations on the final day of a summit that has yielded little progress on climate change and trade.
With President Barack Obama travelling on to Ghana for his first visit to Africa as president, the United States used the L'Aquila summit to push for a shift towards farm investment from food aid and will make $3.5 billion available to the three-year programme.
"There is no reason Africa should not be self-sufficient when it comes to food," said Mr Obama, recalling that his relatives in Kenya live "in villages where hunger is real", though they themselves are not going hungry.
Mr Obama said Africa had enough arable land but lacked seeds, irrigation and mechanisms for farmers to get a fair price for their produce - issues that the Group of Eight richest nations, emerging powers and African countries promised to tackle.
But Africa told the wealthy powers they must honour their commitments, old and new - mindful that some in the G8 had fallen well short of their 2005 promise to hike annual aid by $50 billion by 2010, half of which was meant for Africa.
South African President Jacob Zuma said the new funding will "go a long way" to helping Africa, adding: "We can't say it's enough, but at least it begins to do very concrete things."
Nigerian Agriculture Minister Abba Ruma said the new pledge was "very commendable in view of the current global recession". But he warned it must be "disbursed expeditiously. It is only then we will know that the G8 is living up to its commitment and not just making a pledge and going to sleep".
The United Nations says the number of malnourished people has risen in the past two years and is expected to top 1.02 billion this year, reversing decades of declines. The global recession is expected to make 103 million more go hungry.
Aid bodies like the World Food Programme said a last-minute surge of generosity at the summit in L'Aquila resulting in the $20 billion pledge was "greeted with great happiness". That amount over three years may compare unfavourably with the $13.4 billion the G8 says it has already disbursed between January 2008 and July 2009, but aid groups said the new funding pledged in Italy was more clearly focused.
Japan and the European Union were also championing a code of conduct for responsible investment in the face of growing farmland acquisition or "land grabs" in emerging nations.
The L'Aquila summit has produced chequered results on other issues, making only limited progress in crucial climate talks following the refusal by major developing nations to sign up to the goal of halving world greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
The 17 biggest emitters in the Major Economies Forum chaired by Obama failed to get emerging powers like China and India to accept these targets, though they did agree temperature rises should be limited to 2 Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit).
But Mr Obama, also suffering a delay to his own global warming bill in the U.S. Congress, said the talks had created momentum for a new UN climate change pact in Copenhagen in December.
G8 leaders said the global financial crisis still posed serious risks to the world economy. Further stimulus packages for growth might still be required and it was dangerous to implement "exit strategies" from emergency measures too early.
"Reaching the bottom of the slump is not when you start with exit strategies," said German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
Mr Obama also pointed to the demise of the G8, saying tackling global challenges "in the absence of major powers like China, India and Brazil seems to be wrongheaded".
Reuters