[Congressional Bills 107th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Con. Res. 102 Introduced in House (IH)]
107th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. CON. RES. 102
Relating to efforts to reduce hunger in sub-Saharan Africa.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
April 4, 2001
Mr. Leach (for himself and Mr. Payne) submitted the following
concurrent resolution; which was referred to the Committee on
International Relations
_______________________________________________________________________
CONCURRENT RESOLUTION
Relating to efforts to reduce hunger in sub-Saharan Africa.
Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring),
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This concurrent resolution may be cited as the ``Hunger to Harvest
Resolution: A Decade of Concern for Africa''.
SEC. 2. FINDINGS.
Congress finds the following:
(1) Despite progress in recent years, sub-Saharan Africa
enters the new millennium with many of the world's poorest
countries and is the one area of the world where hunger is both
pervasive and increasing.
(2) 33 of the world's 41 poorest debtor countries are in
sub-Saharan Africa, and approximately 291,000,000 individuals
in sub-Saharan Africa, nearly half of sub-Saharan Africa's
total population, currently live in extreme poverty on less
than $1 a day.
(3) One in three people in sub-Saharan Africa is
chronically undernourished, and the number of chronically
undernourished people in the region has doubled in the past
three decades. One child out of every seven dies before his or
her fifth birthday, and one-half of these deaths are due to
malnutrition.
(4) Sub-Saharan Africa is the region in the world most
affected by global infectious disease, accounting for one-half
of infectious disease-caused deaths worldwide, according to a
January 2000 report by the Central Intelligence Agency. Deaths
from HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, cholera, and several
other diseases in sub-Saharan Africa exceed those in all other
regions.
(5) Sub-Saharan Africa is home to 70 percent of adults and
80 percent of children living with the HIV virus, and to three-
quarters of the people worldwide who have died of AIDS since
the epidemic began.
(6) According to the World Bank, the HIV/AIDS pandemic has
erased many of the development gains of the past generation in
sub-Saharan Africa and now threatens to undermine economic and
social prospects for the next generation, with life expectancy
in parts of sub-Saharan Africa having already decreased on
average by 10-20 years as a result of AIDS.
(7) Despite these development challenges, the number of
sub-Saharan African countries that are moving toward open
economies and more accountable government has increased, and
these countries are together beginning to establish local
solutions to the problems of the region.
(8) To make lasting improvements in the lives of their
people, sub-Saharan African governments need to be supported as
they take meaningful steps to reduce conflict, advance economic
reform, stimulate growth, improve governance, and make
essential investments in people and infrastructure.
(9) Notwithstanding sub-Saharan Africa's enormous
development challenges, United States companies hold
approximately $15,000,000,000 in investments in sub-Saharan
Africa, greater than United States investments in either the
Middle East or Eastern Europe, and total United States trade
with sub-Saharan Africa currently exceeds that with all of the
independent states of the former Soviet Union, including the
Russian Federation. This economic relationship could be put at
risk without greater attention to growth and poverty-focused
development in sub-Saharan Africa.
(10) Bread for the World Institute calculates that the goal
of reducing world hunger in one-half not later than 2015 is
achievable through an increase of $4,000,000,000 in annual
funding for effective, poverty-focused development from all
donors. If the United States were to shoulder one-fourth of the
aid burden--approximately $1,000,000,000 a year--the obligation
of America would amount to a penny per day per citizen.
(11) According to a recent nationwide poll by the Program
on International Policy Attitudes, 83 percent of Americans
think that the United States should be willing to commit to a
joint plan for cutting world hunger by one-half by the year 2015.
(12) Sustainable development and poverty reduction in sub-
Saharan Africa cannot occur without additional public and
private sector investment.
(13) Failure to effectively address sub-Saharan Africa's
crisis of development could result in heightened instability on
the continent, greater political conflict, and increased
poverty, increasing the prospect of humanitarian intervention
and potentially threatening a wide range of United States
interests.
(14) Efforts to reduce hunger and poverty should begin in
sub-Saharan Africa, where conditions are both widespread and
increasing. The right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of
happiness should not be denied to people simply because they
live on an impoverished continent.
SEC. 3. SENSE OF CONGRESS.
It is the sense of Congress that--
(1) a moral people cannot tolerate the existence of hunger,
poverty, and disease in any part of the world;
(2) the United States should declare A Decade of Concern
for Africa and commit to increased levels of effective,
poverty-focused development assistance to sub-Saharan Africa
until significant progress is made toward reversing current
levels of hunger and poverty;
(3) the President should work with the heads of other
advanced industrial countries and sub-Saharan African
countries, and with United States and sub-Sharan African
private voluntary organizations and other civic organizations,
to increase development assistance for sub-Saharan Africa and
ensure that such assistance is used effectively to reduce
hunger and poverty;
(4) Congress should undertake a multi-year commitment with
other donors to provide the resources necessary to cut hunger
by one-half in sub-Saharan Africa, with funding directed
toward--
(A) health, including efforts to prevent, treat,
and control HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria, and
promote maternal health and child survival;
(B) education, with an emphasis on equal access to
learning for girls and women;
(C) agriculture, food systems, infrastructure and
rural development;
(D) micro-finance development; and
(E) bilateral and multilateral debt relief that
enables sub-Saharan African countries to invest in
poverty-focused development, and strengthens and
expands democratic participation, free markets, trade,
and investment;
(5) such funding should support both bilateral and
multilateral poverty-focused development efforts in sub-Saharan
Africa, including efforts by nongovernmental and private
voluntary organizations, including faith-based institutions;
and
(6) the Administrator of the United States Agency for
International Development, in consultation with the heads of
other appropriate agencies, should annually prepare and submit
to Congress a report on the progress achieved in the
implementation of paragraphs (3) and (4).
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