Banks in Europe

IN WEALTHY EUROPE, SOME STILL GO HUNGRY

Europe is facing challenges we thought we had already beaten - poverty, high unemployment and food shortages. The European Federation of Food Banks, which coordinates 245 food collection and distribution centers in 19 countries, helps feed 5 million needy Europeans - a number that has grown considerably with the current financial crisis. However, the continental food aid programme is now in danger of being curtailed, or even closed down, by EU leaders just when it is needed most. Coinciding with the European summit on June 26 , the EFFB calls on EU leaders to keep this valuable programme going.



The European winter of 1947 was one of the hardest of the 20th century. And the summer of that year was one of the driest. Across the post-war continent, crops failed and food shortages became acute. In regions where, even during the war, the daily supply of calories to adults was above 2,000, that number dropped by half. In some countries, it fell to a third of that amount.

It’s hard to imagine such hardship nowadays. The European Union appears to have resolved the continent’s food problems. In most EU countries, each person’s average consumption is above 3,500 calories a day - almost double what the FAO considers to be the daily minimum (1,900 calories).

And yet, we should not allow these apparently comfortable circumstances to draw our attention away from important imbalances, especially during the economic crisis currently affecting many EU countries.



The apparent abundance in this part of the world, as in the United States and Canada, conceals serious food needs among the less well-off. The recent increase in the requests for help from food banks and similar charitable institutions shows that the problem exists and cannot be ignored.

Up to last year, the EU ran a food aid programme that was linked to the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). The programme took some of the excess production generated by the CAP and gave it to the needy.

But the fall in stockpiles, as well as the unwillingness of some EU member states to purchase food for the needy on the open market, has brought the food aid programme to breaking point. As things stand, it appears doomed.

In response, the European Commission has tabled a proposal - to be discussed at next week’s European summit - to set up, as part of the 2014-2020 budget framework, “a new food aid mechanism for the needy.”



In an effort to overcome the opposition of some member states, this fund would not be part of the CAP, nor of the European Social Fund, but would be a sui generis programme devised to back up the EU2020 social cohesion and territorial strategy policies.

The proposed financing for this programme amounts to just 335 million euros a year, compared with 500 million euros a year for the programme that is about to end.

This sum is a drop in the ocean when considering the scale of European funds, and paltry when compared to financial aid for banks.

Even so, it should not be dismissed, especially when food aid is a much-needed additional response to situations which most national welfare systems have trouble coping with.



The work carried out by organizations such as the Food Banks does not have to do simply with the distribution of aid.

It is also a way of reaching out to those on the fringes of society and drawing them back in. We don’t just give people something to eat. We also offer hope to those who, in many cases, have lost everything. And in conjunction with other charity groups we help pull society closer together in times of need, such as the period we are currently going through.



The EU faces huge challenges that will test its sense of unity and demonstrate whether our society is still an international benchmark for social integration and citizenship.

The EU cannot scrap a programme like food aid, which is the only one that provides close contact with people living in poverty and outside the mainstream of society.



The consequences of discontinuing the programme would be devastating.

In some cases, all food aid would stop. In others, it would be cut in half. Many of the associations we work with could be forced to shut down, undoing the bonds of social networks they help to create.

It would also deepen the sentiment that European institutions are distant and blind to the concrete needs of real people.



One of the motives of the creation of the European Union and the CAP was to avoid a repeat of what occurred in 1947. It wasn’t that long ago and we shouldn’t forget it. We are confident that European leaders won’t forget it when they meet in Brussels next week.



By Isabel Jonet

President of the European Federation of Food Banks

Photo: Human Ring against poverty, European Parliament © Alejandra Laiton.</div>