Poverty and hunger are inseparable Siamese twins. Hunger is manifested in a number of forms; foremost are the malnutrition, violence; however, joblessness and prolonged working hours are the reasons of hunger. Hunger is also intertwined with malnutrition. Against the backdrop of 854 million hungry people in the world, the number of hungry population in Bangladesh alone as 30 million. Twenty-four humans die every minute from hunger; and a staggering 16,000 children die every day.

Of the hungry people of the world 80 percent live in the rural areas, of them 70 percent are women. Surprisingly women produce 80 percent of the world's food but only 10 percent of them enjoy their right to own and control land. Statistics also says, the number of death related to malnourishment is far more than the combined number of deaths from AIDS, malaria and TB. Malnourishment as a symptom of hunger is most commonly observed in Asia, particularly in India and China where 363 million malnourished people struggle to survive.

A 35 years experience of ActionAid in working to fight poverty shows that hunger is more than a normative phenomenon, it is a result of historical injustice and denial of rights resulted in the human degradation and barrier to access the fruits of justice. It considers the entire issue as a result of politics and power tilted against the poor. This anti poverty international organization has launched a 5-year global "Hungerfree" campaign in Geneva this July. It targets the respective governments and the rich of the world to remind of their promises for halving the number of the famished by 2015 as set forth in the Millennium Development Goal.

The campaign sets to initiate work in all 42 countries where the organization works. The campaign was launched just before the ECOSOC meeting in Geneva. That governments around the world are failing in their duty to respect, protect and fulfil people's right to food was maintained by Chief Executive of Action Aid Ramesh Singh in UN who said, "Seven years ago when governments promised to halve hunger there were 800 million hungry people across the globe -- now there are 854 million people going hungry." The campaign also demands a different response from states -- legally enforceable standards like dignified work for the poor to end hunger.

Hunger is a result of not having access to food though there is enough food to feed the entire 6.5 billion souls of the planet. But the fact is, people cannot access food just because they cannot buy food; and they cannot buy food because they do not have work to earn the money. So the real problem is rooted in the problem of distribution of world's wealth and subsequently, in the access to food. This global campaign is demanding actions from governments, intergovernmental organisations and corporations to end hunger-related deaths by providing appropriate and sustainable access to food. AAI will draw attention of the people on 'what is being done' and more importantly, 'what is not being done by political leaders worldwide' with the help of this campaign.

This year being the mid-way point of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) set in 2000, its launching is coincided with the mid-term evaluation of the MDGs. The UN Economic, Cultural and Social Council (ECOSOC) sat in Geneva to review the progress towards the MDGs.

Six countries affected by hunger will be reporting to this meeting on their efforts to improve food security over the last seven years. They are Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Cambodia, Ghana, Cape Verde and Barbados. The new global campaign "End Hunger" combines a three-pronged strategy to pressure the governments on the issues like respecting, protecting and fulfilling the right to food, strengthening corporate regulations and expose companies when they exploit poor people and giving poor women access to land so that their right to land is protected and they can control the food they grow.

End Monga: Bangladesh focus

Hunger and famine-like situation prevails in north-western regions particularly during the lean season as the poorest do not have access to livelihoods and work. Monga, seasonal chronic food shortage among the absolute poor in the selected northern district of Bangladesh, is one of the major indicators how acute poverty exists in the country. Starting from mid September to the end of November, Monga coincides with man's harvesting cycle. During the interim period, there are no alternative economic activities left for the rural people living in the area. They are mainly sharecroppers, day-labourers in agriculture and petty traders. During these months, these people from Nilphamari, Kurigram, Lalmonirhat, Rangpur, Jamalpur and Sherpur districts face serious liquidity shortage as the economic activity is lowest in the area.

The dire condition of agro-product based industries like Jute, Cotton, Sugar or Paper in North Bengal, low price for agro products, denial of state to particular land use pattern amongst the indigenous people like the Santals, Oraons, Munda, and Mahali, forced sale of land by marginal peoples, poor wage in agricultural forms and scarcity of work are the causes of Monga. There has been a major change in the agro-industry dependency in North Bengal over the last two decades. Structural adjustment has led to the closure of agro based industries which has resulted in creation of industrial unemployment on one hand and turning the land into mono-crop on the other. Thus, the grim situation of both agriculture and industrialisation has marked the characteristics of North Bengal economy with unemployment and hardcore poverty.

The over-all context of Monga has led AAB to initiate a campaign to end Monga from the coming August. One of the major objectives of the campaign will be to ensure 100 days legally guaranteed work scheme during the lean season to the poorest with a minimum wage that will cover the basic needs of a household a day. By the end of 2007, there will be another component: introduction of appropriate technology on fish-rice-jute cultivation for the marginal farmers. It will also introduce school feeding for primary school children where procurement of and preparation of the meal will be done by the people affected by hunger. This will generate greater value for the small producers and demonstrate to the government how school meal can both create opportunities and feed children.

It will also collect alternative statistics of the area to learn about hunger situation in those districts. This will result in tracking government and non-government welfare mechanisms in the area which will reveal the system loss. Its partners will hold public hearings and people's audit to make the institutions accountable in delivering the government programmes. There will also be tri-partite work with local government to make the institutions accessible for the poor people. This will, probably, find a way to reach the stakeholders.

The writers work for Action Aid Bangladesh.