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SEN. Mar
Roxas II is asking leaders of the Association of
Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) to convene an emergency
summit to tackle the looming rice crisis and ensure food
security in the region.
“As the
biggest rice-importing country in Asia, if not the
world, we can and should take the lead in asking the
Asean community to help ensure food security in the
region,” Roxas said, as he confirmed plans to file a
resolution on Monday for the Senate to take the lead in
calling for such a summit amid growing concerns over a
food-supply problem likely to hit Asian countries in the
coming months.
In a
statement over the weekend, Roxas noted that the Asean
has in its membership the world’s two biggest rice
exporters and the world’s biggest rice importer.
He added
that the proposed Asean Leaders’ Summit has “the
opportunity to ease the fear and crisis that is gripping
both the producing farmers and consumer families across
Asean and the region.”
“This
kind of crisis is exactly why Asean exists. Asean must
address and intervene in this crisis to prove to the
world that it can take the lead in the political and
economic integration of its member-nations,” he pointed
out.
Roxas
recommended that the proposed Asean leaders’ summit
could even include non-Asean neighbors such as Japan,
South Korea and China, for an Asean Plus Three Summit,
as well as multinational financial institutions, that
have critical interests on both the consumer and
producer sides of the current crisis.
He
suggested that Asean members should take the initiative
to help each other out to ensure regional stability as
food and oil prices continue to soar, recalling that the
last summit held in Singapore, had adopted a new Asean
Charter that provides for such action.
“This
document will be meaningless if the leaders of Asean
cannot get together to ensure solidarity against hunger
that is made worse by soaring rice and food prices,” he
said.
Roxas
warned that food riots and civil unrest have broken out
in other parts of the world because of the effects of a
global food shortage. “In fact, the head of the UN Food
and Agriculture Organization had already called for a
summit of global leaders in June to discuss the alarming
food situation.”
Roxas
also cited reports quoting FAO chief Jacques Diouf
admitting that, “in the face of food riots around the
world like in
Africa, and
Haiti, we really have an emergency.”
According to Roxas, the Department of Foreign Affairs
can initiate talks on a special leaders’ summit by
citing a provision in the Asean Charter on Summits that
allows its leaders to hold a summit to “address
emergency situations affecting Asean by taking action.”
To
buttress his point, he likewise cited the Asean
Charter’s preamble that resolved “to ensure sustainable
development for the benefit of present and future
generations and to place the well-being, livelihood and
welfare of the peoples at the center of the Asean
community-building process.”
At the
same time, Roxas recalled, for instance, that during the
Special Leaders’ Summit on SARS held in Bangkok,
Thailand, on April 29, 2003, Asean agreed to set up a
regional information network and early-warning system to
help stop the spread of SARS, according to a joint
declaration.
He also
pointed to other precedents to back up his call for an
emergency Asean Summit on the Rice, Food and Oil Crisis,
citing the January 6, 2005, Asean Leaders’ Special
Meeting on the Aftermath of Earthquake and Tsunami
disasters in Jakarta, Indonesia, which led to a joint
declaration for the urgent mobilization of additional
resources to meet the emergency relief needs of victims
in the affected countries.
In the
same meeting, he added, the Asean leaders agreed to
request the United Nations to appoint a Special
Representative of the UN Secretary General to mobilize
the international community to support the national
relief emergency programs in the affected countries.
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