UN General Assembly
2008

the challenge of the food crisis. But our weakness is above all our lack of the technical, economic and structural capacity to create the conditions for agricultural production and productivity. I welcome the measures taken in June this year at the World Food Summit of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), held in Rome, on the food crisis. The initiative on the upswing in the price of foodstuffs should mainly be based on stimulating food production in our countries. For that, we look forward to implementation of the International Monetary Fund proposal to double its aid to agriculture on the African continent, in the hope of strengthening the productive capacity of our farmers and creating the structural conditions for the production and marketing of agricultural goods. As part of regional talks on the food crisis, held in Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of the Congo on 29 July this year, under the aegis of the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS), it was agreed to make effective the Maputo Declaration and