Published: Thursday, 03 March 2016 17:32
The National Coordinator of the Sierra Leone Alliance Against Hunger Edward Jusu has disclosed that his organisation and partners including FOCUS 1000 were happy that the “Right to Food” has been included in the first draft of the Review Constitution of the country.
“It is the dream of my organisation and partners to see that access to food for all is included in the primary national document of the country.”
It could be recalled that when the Constitutional Review Committee (CRC) started to call on organisation to present position paper on what should be included in the revised constitution, the Scaling up Nutrition Civil Socirty Platform Movement Chaired by FOCUS 1000 and co-Chaired by Hellen Keller International developed and presented a position paper titled “The Right to Food.”
The Right to Food Position Paper calls on government commitment to endorsed access to quality food into new constitution. The paper also advocates for women to be given the rights to own their own firm lands.
The first draft of the constitution makes provision in section 1, 2 and 3 amongst others the access to quality food a right.
To support the position of Mr. Jusu, the Coordinator of the Scaling Up Nutrition and Immunization Civil Society Platform (SUNI-CSP) Ramatu Jalloh said the global reports on Hunger, Malnutrition and Health states that one of the courses why Sierra Leone is still faced with acute malnutrition problems over the year was because women are still not having equal access to land like their men counterparts. She added that the only way to have food sufficiency and fight malnutrition and acute hunger, women should have equal opportunity to own, operate and managed their own farm lands, Ramatu emphasised.
A follow up meeting will be held in order for partners to brainstorm how some of the positions left out from the Rights to Food Position Paper to be included in the second draft.
By: Mohamed Belloh Dukuray