Essays on Food, Hunger, Nutrition, Primary Health Care and Development (AVIVA, 480 p.): 33. The World Declaration on Nutrition and the 1992 International Conference on Nutrition (ICN) Plan of Action: The Cutting Edge of Conventional Thinking.*: Where are we left after ICN?

Essays on Food, Hunger, Nutrition, Primary Health Care and Development (AVIVA, 480 p.)

33. The World Declaration on Nutrition and the 1992 International Conference on Nutrition (ICN) Plan of Action: The Cutting Edge of Conventional Thinking.*

		(introduction...)
		Do international conferences solve world problems?
		Do international declarations change the course of history?
		Do international conferences overlap in their purposes?
		Do international conferences bring out the best in the process of their preparation?
		Where are we left after ICN?

Where are we left after ICN?

If one can paraphrase the two Director's General of WHO and FAO in their speeches, the ICN was to represent “the crowning achievement of all our past efforts”; on that count, I think the achievement was poor. If the ICN was to represent a planetary pact for nutritional wellbeing - I think the pact was weak. If the ICN was to open a new area for dialogue and concerted action - I think the dialogue was there, the concerted action remains to be seen. If the ICN allowed us to take a new look at the fundamental issues of food and nutrition - I think the look was definitely not new. If the answer to the food and nutrition problems can only be found through profound reflection and unfailing determination - I think the reflection remained rather shallow and the determination, so far, is mostly only on paper.

It is easy “to be a general after the battle”, and for that I take full blame. The period leading towards ICN had an air of low expectations that I felt very strongly in my involvement in the early preparatory stages in Africa. UNCEN's euphoria was difficult to beat, granted. But ICN could have done better.

Claudio Schuftan
IPO Box 369, Hanoi.