World Bank Group President, Robert B. Zoellick , Opening Remarks 2008 Annual Meetings, Program of Seminars

Robert B. Zoellick

President, the World Bank Group

2008 Annual Meetings, Program of Seminars

“The Shame of Hunger" with Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel

Friday, October 10, 2008

MR. ZOELLICK:  Good afternoon.  It's a great pleasure to welcome all of you to the second part of the Program of Seminars, and especially to have the honor of welcoming Professor Elie Wiesel to the World Bank Group to speak to us today about the food crisis.

This year's Program of Seminars deals with the pressing issues of the day:  the global financial turmoil, high food and fuel prices, and the policy implications for both developed and developing countries.

As all of you know, soaring food prices have put an enormous stress on the most vulnerable this year.  In Liberia, in Ghana, in Haiti, staple food prices are more than double what they were just a year ago.  Combined with the increase in fuel prices, the effects have been that poor families have had to skip meals, buy lower-quality food­stuffs, and reduce their expenditure on schooling, often by not sending girls to school.

I just attended one of the most striking events that we've had here so far earlier today with a program we have with adolescent girls.  We had young girls from Guatemala and Laos and Liberia speak to us about their experience in a project that we've tried to launch with Nike Foundation and others for countries suffering conflicts.  And I just have to tell you, I hope we got it on tape because we have got to show it.  It just left everybody just extremely moved with what these young girls can contribute if you give them the chance, but also how they're held back.  And with the problem with food and fuel, what we've seen all around the world is that when people's families come under stress, it's the young girls that are kept back first.  They are not sent to school.  They're the ones that can be sacrificed, and we lose a generation, and we lose a whole opportunity for hope.

In addition, in agricultural communities all around the developing world, farmers can't afford fertilizers or have water or the seeds for agricultural purposes.

This crisis is about the prices of food and fuel as well as the long-term challenges in agriculture and energy and scarcity of water and land.  But we should never forget that, at heart, it's a crisis about people.  It's always the most vulnerable who suffer the most when crisis hits.  And as such, it's absolutely fitting that Professor Wiesel addresses us today on this topic.

The title of his talk couldn't capture any better the essentially humanitarian nature of the food emergency.  Its title is "The Shame of Hunger."  With these words, Professor Wiesel focuses our attention on hunger not only as a question of high commodity prices, but as a matter of human dignity, and in such matters as Professor Wiesel has written, "To remain silent and indifferent is the greatest shame."

It's a great honor to have him with us today.  I won't review all of his background.  Many of you know it quite well.  But his experiences as a witness to indignity, silence, and indifference are well known.  His extraordinary ability to turn these experiences into activism is worth a few more words.

For over 30 years now, Professor Wiesel has been outspoken about the suffering of all people.  He served as Chairman of the President's Commission on the Holocaust and is the founding Chairman of the United States Holocaust Memorial Council.  He has also defended the cause of Soviet Jews, Nicaragua's Miskito Indians, Argentina's "dis­appeared," Cambodian refugees, the Kurds, the victims of famine and genocide in Africa or apartheid in South Africa, the victims of war in the former Yugoslavia.  He is the founding President of the Paris-based Universal Academy of Cultures.

Elie Wiesel is also a writer and a teacher.  He is the author of more than 40 books of fiction and nonfiction, including two volumes of his memoirs.  He has taught at Boston University since 1976, where he is a member of the faculty in the Department of Religion as well as the Department of Philosophy.

For his literary and human rights activities, he has received numerous other awards, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the U.S. Congressional Gold Medal, the Medal of Liberty Award, and the rank of Grand-Croix in the French Legion of Honor.

In 1986, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace, soon after which he and his wife, Marion, established the Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity to combat indifference, intolerance, and injustice through inter­national dialogue and youth-focused programs to promote acceptance, understanding, and equality.

We are particularly honored to have him with us today.  He has really juggled around his schedule.  He told me he is going to have to leave right after this program.  But it's an honor for us to have him with us.  We hope he can highlight an issue that is critical for those that are most vulnerable at a time of stress.  And so I invite you to join me in welcoming him here with us.

Thank you.