The Rotary Balita no. 690 (February 14, 1952)

Do Watchdogs Help? At the request of Greece, the Special Political Committee voted to replace the Balkans Commission with a small subcommission of the Peace Observation Commission. The U.N. watch along Greece's frontiers had helped to contain the civil war in that country, but there was still tension with Albania and Bulgaria. More eloquent tribute than any words to the watchdog activities of the United Nations was the fact that Yugoslavia, formerly under scrutiny of the Balkans Commission, now asks for a similar commission to keep watch over its own borders with Soviet statellites. The Yugoslav foreign minister charged that they now had 25 divisions "gravitated" toward his country. "A government pursuing at hegemonistic and aggressive foreign policy may not necessarily wish war," he declared, and United Nations watchfulness might prove a deterrent. Why is the World Hungrier Today? Director-General Dodd told the Food and Agriculture Organization that it was due to the failure of members to carry out the recommendations they made to themselves. His annual report to the sixth FAO Conference in Rome showed that "before the war, there was enough food to provide each man, woman, and child with 2,380 calories of energy a day. Now there is enough to provide only 2,260 calories." Nor does this tell the whole story, for this average hides the fact that the majority of mankind get far less, and that the poor are getting poorer while production fails to keep pace with increased population. Mr. Dodd was not entirely despairing, however, In the area of worst want, the Far East, there are 136 million acres of reclaimable land. Vast plans already in operation should be pressed. FAO is helping countries to produce more fertilizer, improve tools and seed, suppress pests like "that flying stomach, the locust, that recognizes no international boundaries," and by furnishing advice of many kinds on farming, fishery, and forestry. What is lacking is the amount of resources made available for this effort. Mr. Dodd proposes that the conference set an over-all target for food production during the next five years, break it down into specific goals for each nation, and call upon them to show what they have achieved at the next conference of FAO. "A new world is coming into existence," he warned, "a world in which those who neglect the common man do so at their peril."