, one of the athletes who urged David Cameron to use Britains 2013 presidency of the G8 to make the fight against hunger and malnutrition a top priority issue. The Summit is part of a series of international efforts which have sought to respond to the "return of hunger" as a high-profile global issue. While the problem of hunger had always remained a pressing concern for hundreds of millions of people, the previous few decades leading up to 2007 had seen considerable progress in reducing the number of people suffering from the condition. The
Green Revolution of the 1960s and 70s had helped propagate improved agricultural technology throughout the world. Progress had been uneven, yet the years that followed generally saw a reduction in the number of people suffering from hunger both as a percentage of the total world population and even in absolute terms. At the turn of the century, estimates from the
World Bank suggested that the numbers suffering from chronic hunger had been reduced to close to 800 million, and the
Millennium Development Goals included a commitment to achieve a further 50% reduction by 2015. By 2008 it was apparent that meeting this goal would be challenging. In some parts of the world, the numbers suffering from hunger had stopped falling, rising due to the
lasting global inflation in the price of food which began in late 2006. In 2008, a
global food crisis saw food riots breaking out in dozens of countries, with governments toppled in
Haiti and
Madagascar. By 2009, World Bank figures suggested the numbers suffering from chronic hunger had increased to just over a billion. Since the ''L'Aquila Food Security Initiative'' which was launched at the
July 2009 G8 Summit, hunger has remained a high-profile issue among the leaders of the advanced economies. 2009 also saw the launch of the UN's
Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN) programme, which has developed into a global movement led principally by developing nations. SUN aims to address the issue of
nutrition as well as raw hunger. As a response to the global food crises which began in 2007, some regions have raised production of drought and pest resistant crops such as
Cassava. While good for providing raw calories, the crop has limited nutritional value and some strains even have
anti-nutritional factors if not cooked properly. Millions of children who do not receive adequate nutrition are at risk of permanent
stunted growth, even if they are eating a normal amount of calories. The second
global food crisis of the 21st century began in late 2010; the
2011 East Africa drought followed shortly afterwards. By mid-2012, the
2012 US drought and a weak
Indian monsoon had raised fears of a possible third global food crisis. David Cameron announced his intention to hold the
Olympic hunger summit in May 2012, a few days after President
Barack Obama had launched the "new alliance for food security and nutrition" at the 2012 G8 Summit. British NGOs such as
ONE and
Save the children had expressed the view that it would be good if Mr Cameron could contribute to the international momentum building to tackle hunger and
malnutrition; Britain is due to assume the presidency of the
G8 in 2013. Just prior to the summit, Cameron was further urged to do this by a group of athletes in an open letter. ==Attendees==