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Asian Development Bank (ADB) plans to provide USD 14 billion to ease food crisis

KUALA LUMPUR, Sep 27 (KUNA) -- Asian Development Bank (ADB) plans to provide at least USD 14 billion over 2022- 2025, to ease the worsening food crisis in Asia and the Pacific, and strengthening food systems against the impacts of climate change and biodiversity loss.
A press release by the (ADB) on the sidelines of its 55th annual meeting said that 1.1 billion people in the region lacks healthy food systems due to poverty and increasing prices.
The funding will be channeled through existing and new projects in sectors including farm inputs, food production and distribution, social protection, irrigation, and water resources management, energy transition, transport, access to rural finance, environmental management, health, and education.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine has disrupted supplies of food staples and fertilizer, straining a global food system already weakened by climate change impacts, pandemic-related supply shocks, and unsustainable farming practices, it added.
In this regard, (ADB) President Masatsugu Asakawa said , " this is a timely and urgently needed response to a crisis that is leaving too many poor families in Asia hungry and in deeper poverty, Assistance under the program will start this year and continue through 2025. It will be drawn from across ADB's sovereign and private sector operations, and seek to leverage an additional USD 5 billion in private sector to finance for food security, Asakawa stated.
ADB is committed to achieving a prosperous, inclusive, resilient, and sustainable Asia and the Pacific, while sustaining its efforts to eradicate extreme poverty. Established in 1966, it is owned by 68 members-49 from the region.(end) aab.nhq