A statement released by the foundation yesterday said Gates spoke at the United Nations (UN) 35th Session of the International Fund for Agriculture Development (IFAD)'s Governing Council, entitled "Sustainable smallholder agriculture: Feeding the World, Protecting the Planet" in Rome.
Gates urged all UN bodies responsible for fighting hunger and poverty to streamline their efforts around common target for sustainable productivity and growth to guide and measure their efforts.
He explained that his foundation had fallen short of delivering help to small farmers in developing countries when they needed it and further announced an agriculture grant of about $200 million (N32 billion) bringing the foundation's grants to more than $2 billion.
Gates told IFAD, the World Food Programme (WFP), and the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) that the approach being used today to fight poverty and hunger is outdated and inefficient and urged the UN bodies to commit to a concrete measurable target for increasing productivity and to support a system of public scorecards for themselves, donors and the countries they support.
"If you care about the poorest, you care about agriculture. Investments in agriculture are the best weapons against hunger and poverty, and they have made life better for billions of people.
"The international agriculture community needs to be more innovative, coordinated and focused to help poor farmers grow more. If we can do that, we can dramatically reduce suffering and build self-sufficiency," he said.
The money will fund agricultural development projects that are already producing great results for farmers, with a goal to help millions of small farmers lift themselves out of poverty.
These include support to breaking down gender barriers so women farmers can increase productivity, controlling contamination that affects 25 percent of world food crops and creating an innovative system to monitor the effects of agricultural productivity on the population and environment.
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