Essay On Right To Food Right

1581 Words7 Pages

Introduction The right to food, deemed as a human right indispensable for the realization of other human rights, has been recognized in a plethora of international, regional, and national legal instruments since the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. However, legal, political, financial, and economic factors compromise a further recognition, thus the full realization, of the right in question. Assuming the right to food is a basic human right, we deem a further implementation of the right to be an urgent necessity both for institutions and organizations, at all levels, and for transnational corporations. In this regard, monitoring mechanisms and accountability should increase for all the actors involved. In the first part, we will consider the definition of the right to food and its historical recognition process by analysing the international legal …show more content…

Article 11.1 of the Covenant (UN General Assembly, 1966) proclaimed ‘the right of everyone to an adequate standard of living for himself and his family, including food’, and Article 11.2 obligates State Parties to adopt measures and programmes for the ‘fundamental right to freedom from hunger and malnutrition’ (ibid). Under the ICESCR, State Parties are obliged to engage all appropriate measures, to the maximum of available resources, to progressively achieve the right to food for all. The right to food, in fact, imposes three obligations on State Parties (CESCR, 1999): a) they must respect existing access to food by not limiting such access to anyone; b) they must protect people from third parties (such as individuals, groups, private companies) which prevent the access to food; c) they must fulfil, which means both facilitate access to food (by strengthening people’s food security) and provide it (only whenever an individual or group is unable to enjoy the

Open Document