On Monday, June 10th, the Director of the World Food Programme (WFP) Centre of Excellence against Hunger in Brazil, Daniel Balaban, took part in the 4th edition of the Brazilian Supermarket Association’s (ABRAS) National Supply Chain Forum on ESG (Environment, Social and Governance). The event, which takes place annually, brought together sector and business leaders and government authorities in a debate on the main strategic, economic, marketing, institutional and regulatory challenges facing the national supply chain.
In 2024, the Forum aimed to present concrete proposals for solving the challenges identified and to discuss the proposals that had emerged during previous Forums. In the panel formed by the Association’s institutional supporters, Daniel Balaban gave a brief overview of the current hunger situation in Brazil and the world and pointed to possible solutions for eradicating the problem. “Today, the biggest causes of hunger in the world are, firstly, conflicts and wars that cause small family farmers to be displaced from their land and unable to produce. The second reason that increases hunger in the world is climate disasters: droughts are getting stronger and floods are destroying more and more crops,’ said Daniel.
The Director of the Centre of Excellence pointed to Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 17, which talks about strengthening the means of implementation and revitalizing the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development, as one of the ways to overcome the challenge. For him, dialogue and unity, combined with the development and strengthening of public policies, are the solution to eradicating hunger. ‘There is no magic, everything is a consequence of public policies. If we stop investing in populations, the number of people who fall below the poverty line increases. It’s much cheaper to invest in public protection policies than to bear the costs of hunger and extreme poverty,’ adds Daniel.
The panel was also attended by Camila Valverde Santana, Impact Director of the UN Global Compact Network Brazil, and Fernando Gâmboa, KPMG’s Consumer and Retail Partner in Brazil and South America.
The full event can be accessed here.