ISLAMABAD, Aug 21: The targets of the World Food Summit 1996 are as elusive as ever six years later, a Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) report warns.

“The target of the Summit to halve the number of hungry people in 1990-92 (815 million) by 2015 will not be met even by 2030,” the FAO said.

The summary report was a shorter version of the results of the technical FAO study: “World agriculture: towards 2015/2030” which would be published later.

The report presents the latest FAO assessment of long-term developments in world food, nutrition and agriculture. The FAO issued similar studies on global agriculture in 1995, 1988, 1981 and 1970. This one covers about 140 countries including Pakistan and 32 crop and livestock commodities.

Although global food production will continue to outpace world population growth in the coming decades, hundreds of millions of people in developing countries could remain hungry by 2030, FAO warned.

According to the FAO report, the current number of hungry people, 777 million, is projected to decrease to 440 million in 2030.

Developing countries will increasingly depend on cereal, meal and milk imports as their production will not keep pace with the demand, the report says.

By 2030, they could be producing only 86 per cent of their own cereal needs while traditional grain exporters such as the US, the European Union, Canada, Australia and Argentina are expected to produce the surpluses needed to fill the gap.

“If real food prices do not rise, and exports of industrial products and services grow as previously, then most countries will be able to afford to import cereals to meet their needs,” the report says. “However, the poorest countries tend to be the least able to pay for imports.”

Among the main findings of the report are projections that world population will grow from around 6 billion people today to 8.3 billion people in 2030. It will grow at an average of 1.1 per cent a year up to 2030, compared to 1.7 per cent annually over the past 30 years.

The report predicts that the world population will be increasingly well-fed by 2030, with 3,050 kcal available per person, compared to 2,360 kcal per person per day in the mid- 1960s and 2,800 kcal today.

This change reflects above all the rising consumption in many developing countries where the average will be close to 3,000 kcal in 2030.

The report says that cereals are still by far the world’s most important sources of food, both for direct human consumption and meat production. An extra billion tonnes of cereals will be needed by 2030.

However, it says, by 2030, the developing countries could be producing only 86 per cent of their own cereal needs, with net imports rising from 103 million tonnes to 265 million tonnes.