Remarks by Assistant Secretary Marisa Lago to the Partnership to End Hunger and Poverty in Africa’s Annual Forum

In 2009, thanks to U.S. leadership, the leaders of the G-8 countries and other heads of state pledged $22 billion for agricultural development in poor countries at the L’Aquila Summit. The United States pledged $3.5 billion and we are making progress against that pledge. USAID Deputy Administrator (Donald) Steinberg already talked about one part of the U.S. approach this morning—the Feed the Future initiative. And Under Secretary Bartuska just provided us with a great overview of U.S. and multilateral efforts on agricultural research.

 

I’ll round out the picture by talking about another key facet of the Administration’s Feed the Future initiative – the Global Agriculture and Food Security Program or GAFSP. A key theme of the Obama Administration has been the importance of partnering with others in multilateral efforts to address global problems. Tackling global food security requires collective action. At a time whenmany donors, including the United States, face resource constraints, leveraging those resources and strengthening international cooperation is vital. GAFSP provides the mechanism for partnering with others in the global community—development partners, developing countries, multilateral institutions, civil society and the private sector. GAFSP brings us together to make tangible progress in reducing hunger and poverty in some of the world’s poorest countries.