Bhubaneswar: Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has congratulated the World Food Programme (WFP) on being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for 2020.
“Congratulate World Food Programme on being awarded Nobel Peace Prize 2020 for its efforts to combat hunger, especially for its efforts to prevent the use of hunger as a weapon of war and conflict. Well-deserved”, the CM tweeted.
Congratulate #WorldFoodProgramme on being awarded #NobelPeacePrize2020 for its efforts to combat hunger, especially for its efforts to prevent the use of hunger as a weapon of war and conflict. Well-deserved. @WFP
— Naveen Patnaik (@Naveen_Odisha) October 9, 2020
The Norwegian Nobel Committee has decided to award the Nobel Peace Prize for 2020 to the WFP for its efforts to combat hunger, for its contribution to bettering conditions for peace in conflict-affected areas and for acting as a driving force in efforts to prevent the use of hunger as a weapon of war and conflict.
The World Food Programme is the world’s largest humanitarian organisation addressing hunger and promoting food security. In 2019, the WFP provided assistance to close to 100 million people in 88 countries who are victims of acute food insecurity and hunger. In 2015, eradicating hunger was adopted as one of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.
The WFP is the UN’s primary instrument for realising this goal. In recent years, the situation has taken a negative turn. In 2019, 135 million people suffered from acute hunger, the highest number in many years. Most of the increase was caused by war and armed conflict.