Call for debt payment moratorium on food crisis countries

As the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation meets today to discuss the food crisis in Rome, debt campaigners have issued a call for a moratorium on debt repayments from afflicted countries.

Jubilee Debt Campaign and Christian Aid warn that the World Bank's fund of £60 million to fight the food crisis, the majority of which is in the form of more loans, is little more than "a sticking plaster" on the problem.

They are calling for faster debt cancellation rather than new loans to tackle the food crisis, and more specifically appealing to Chancellor Alistair Darling nd other G8 country finance ministers to cancel Haiti's more than £60 million debt burden.

Despite being promised debt cancellation in 2006, Haiti is still paying around £500,000 a week to the developed countries in debt repayments, even though food prices have sparked hunger and riots that have led to the dismissal of the Prime Minister.

Christian Aid and Jubilee Debt Campaign point out that the World Bank's emergency grant to Haiti, announced last Friday, will only cover Haiti's debt repayments for the next 10 weeks, while the UN has predicted increased food prices for 10 years.

Christian Aid's country representative in Haiti, Prospery Raymond, said:
"There is so little money left in the budget after paying the interest on the debt. There is hardly any room for manoeuvre in paying food subsidies. Granting a debt moratorium is something that the international community has the power to do that would make a huge difference to Haiti's security in the coming months."

Already five people in Haiti have been killed during rioting over the soaring price of food. Mr Raymond warns that urgent action is needed to prevent more violence.

Nick Dearden, Director of Jubilee Debt Campaign, said: "The World Bank's response is a sticking plaster - Haiti's grant will be cancelled out by debt repayments in ten weeks, while UN experts say high food prices are set to last for ten years.

"A comprehensive response must include accelerated debt cancellation so that poor countries can make their own investments in agriculture and food production.

"In the mean time, there must be a moratorium on debt repayments for the countries on the front line of the food crisis. More loans are not the answer."

Jubilee Debt campaign has issued a call for debt cancellation and an interim moratorium on payments for all developing countries suffering from the food crisis, including Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) yet to complete the process, such as Haiti, or countries such as Bangladesh that are presently excluded from debt relief schemes.

It also seeks recognition by the IMF/ World Bank of the role that economic policy conditions have played in the creation of the food crisis and the immediate cessation of such conditions from debt relief and aid programmes. All international assistance to deal with the food crisis should take the form of grants not loans, it adds.

Dearden said: "It is shocking that while many millions of people in the world are going short of food, their government are still being forced to shell out millions of pounds a week to rich countries and banks.

"The terrible irony is that economic conditions, forced on poor countries by the World Bank and IMF in return for debt relief packages, have actually contributed to the crisis we are witnessing today."