African governments have been challenged to commit to invest 10 percent of their national budgets to agriculture, to overcome the global food crisis. If this is applied, it will be a step towards meeting the first Millennium Development Goal of halving poverty and hunger by 2015.

The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) estimates that at least $14 billion (Shs23.8 trillion) per annum is needed to address this challenge. In Sub-Saharan Africa, the annual additional investment is estimated to be about $5 billion (Shs8.5 trillion).

Mr Joachim von Braun, IFPRI director general in his remarks about the 2008 Global Hunger Index report released ahead of the 'World Food Day' which is marked on October 16 said: "Priorities for action at the national and global level must address the immediate food needs of poor people priced out of food markets".

"At the same time, national governments and the global community should begin to correct previous failures in agricultural policy by investing in agriculture and food production, setting up reliable systems for assisting the most vulnerable people in a timely way, and establishing a fair global trading system and a conducive investment environment," Braun said.

He added that the strategic way forward must be facilitated by international cooperation and guided by strong global governance architecture of agriculture, food, and nutrition.

"To substantially improve food security in the 21st century, changes need to be made now," he added. In Uganda, this financial year, government has earmarked a total of Shs50 billion as credit guarantees for banks that lend for agriculture.

Government also provided tax exemptions to encourage enterprises to go into agricultural processing in rural areas and tax exemptions were provided to encourage investment in the construction of hotels, hospitals and educational institutions.

To address the current food crisis and improve the long-term functioning of the world food system, IFPRI recommends productivity and research, which undertake fast-impact food production programmes in key areas and scale up investments for sustained agricultural productivity, including agricultural science policy and appropriate finance.

Another recommendation is nutrition and social protection, which expands emergency responses and humanitarian assistance to food-insecure people and invest in social protection for nutritional improvement.

In terms of markets and trade recommendations demand elimination of agricultural trade restrictions and facilitate rule-based and fair global and regional trade openness; change biofuel policies; support market-oriented regulation of speculation, and implement innovative virtual grain reserve policies.

The 2008 Global Hunger Index (GHI) says sub-Saharan African countries have the highest level of hunger in the world, with Niger, Sierra Leone and Liberia experiencing "extremely alarming levels of hunger," however, this is still an improvement over 1990 levels.

The study, released on 14 October by anti-hunger non-profits the US-based International Food Policy Research Institute, Ireland's Concern Worldwide and Germany's Welthungerhilfe, compiled the most recent country data available - from 2006. It calculated the rankings based on the percentage of malnourished people, under-five underweight children, and under-five child mortality for 120 countries where hunger is a concern.

The study indicated that the hunger snapshot "offers a picture of the past, not the present," because of the two-year data gap.

Since then, the UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) has measured a more than 50-percent increase in food prices; the price of rice, a staple in most of sub-Saharan Africa, has quadrupled worldwide.

Only Burkina Faso was listed among West African countries as a net exporter of cereals.

Liberia

Liberia's Deputy Information Minister for Public Affairs, Gabriel Williams, told IRIN the index means little for Liberia since the study gathered data from the country's years of civil conflict and economic collapse, and did not cover the most recent post-war gains: "This does not represent the reality on the ground. Within the past two years, the economy is growing and the government is making efforts to ensure full sufficiency."

Williams said President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf launched a campaign in 2007 - called "Back to the Soil" - to increase agricultural self sufficiency.

Niger

Niger had the highest level of hunger in the region. Though its score improved since 1990, this was not enough to inch it out of the study's "extremely alarming" hunger group. But the UN World Food Programme's deputy country director in Niger, Gianluca Ferrera, told IRIN in August the country's global acute malnutrition rate has decreased from 15.3 to 10.7 percent between 2005 and 2008 due to improved treatments for malnutrition.

Sierra Leone

The rank of the third West African country in the "extremely alarming" group, Sierra Leone, stayed the same during the period of the study, which overlapped with the country's 11-year civil war that ended in 2002.

Cyril Lahai, Sierra Leone's FAO representative, told IRIN the government is doing as much as it can to fight hunger, with limited resources. "There are factors that impede the fight, including the high cost of agricultural inputs for farmers to grow their own food, which leads to low levels of crude production. The government is trying to modernise the country's agricultural system and move it into commercial production."

Lahai said the government is looking to complete the transformation within the next five years. "There is hope for the country. I have hope."