UN food summit will be ‘elitist’ and ‘pro-corporate’, says special rapporteur

Michael Fakhri says Thursday's meeting will not be promised people's summit' on tackling world's nutrition crisis

The UN global food summit is elitist and regressive" and has failed in its goal of being a people's summit", according to the special rapporteur on food rights.

As world leaders prepare to attend the virtual event on Thursday, which aims to examine ways to transform global food systems to be more sustainable, Michael Fakhri said it risked leaving behind the very people critical for its success. In an interview with the Guardian, Fakhri said neither the worsening impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the right to food, nor fundamental questions of inequality, accountability and governance were being properly addressed by the meeting.