A United Nations food conference in Rome adopted a final declaration yesterday vowing to “eliminate hunger” caused by soaring food and fuel prices but shelved the contentious issue of biofuels because of unbridgeable differences.

Biofuels emerged as the single largest sticking point at the three-day High Level Conference on World Food Security, held by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO). However, other issues such as food export restrictions also held up the final agreement, with Argentina passionately defending them with support from Venezuela and Cuba.

Food export taxes are a contentious issue in Argentina; farmers have gone on strike to protest against increased taxes on grain and beef exports which Buenos Aires says shield consumers from food inflation and fund schemes to help the poor.

Ed Schafer, the US Agriculture Secretary, said that export restrictions caused inflation. “We understand that countries want to protect their food supply and make sure that there’s enough food for their own citizens, but when there’s a lock-out from the marketplace prices go up,” he said.

Third World nations demanded that Western countries undertake to reduce or eliminate farm subsidies, leaving officials battling at the eleventh hour to rescue the meeting from failure. A concluding press conference by Jacques Diouf, head of the FAO, was postponed repeatedly as wrangling continued beyond the allotted deadline.

“I think we have achieved the results we were hoping for,” Mr Diouf said. It had “not been easy”, but the meeting had taken short-term action and analysed the longer-term problems involved in halving the number of the world’s hungry by 2015.

The final debate revolved around the single word “restrictive” in the phrase “We reaffirm the need to minimise the use of restrictive measures that could increase volatility of international prices”. Argentina demanded that the word “restrictive” be removed or placed in brackets.

The Cuban delegate began an anti-US tirade, attacking America for its “criminal embargo” on Cuba and demanding to know why the declaration failed to condemn either the “speculators and monopolies” who were the true cause of price increases or “the sinister strategy of using grain for fuel”.

The Latin American protesters eventually agreed to back the “consensus”, on condition that their objections were read into the record.

To resolve the biofuels row, the final draft declaration avoided a clear stance, calling instead for “in-depth studies” of biofuels to ensure that their production and use was sustainable. It also called for a “coherent, effective and results-oriented international dialogue on biofuels in the context of food security and sustainable development needs”.

The declaration by 180 countries called for “urgent and co-ordinated action” to combat the negative impacts of soaring food prices on the world’s most vulnerable countries. The current crisis has highlighted the fragility of the world’s food systems and their vulnerability to shocks. It said “the indications are that food prices will remain high in the years to come” and vowed to “secure food for all, today and tomorrow”.

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