Report predicts chronic food shortage in ETimor

16/10/2008 14:14:21

New figures released on World Food Day show up to 70 per cent of families in some parts of East Timor are not confident of finding enough to eat each day.

Aid organisation Oxfam says "food insecurity" in the east Asia and Pacific Region, is fast becoming a chronic problem, and some East Timorese families face a food shortage for up to five months of the year.

The survey also found some children in the Solomon Islands are getting just one small meal and green coconuts each day.

Oxfam Australia executive director, Andrew Hewett, says one part of the solution is getting emergency food aid into problem areas.

"But it's also to rethink our investment in agriculture," he said.

"It's to give it a greater level of priority, it's to recognise that we need to rethink the ways in which we've done agricultural development.

"That's how we can get a sustainable improvement in the situation."

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