UN sets up food crisis task force

Global rice prices have risen by more than 90% in the past year

The United Nations is to set up a task force to tackle the global food crisis.

The UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon, said the rise in food prices around the world had turned into a challenge of global proportions.

The task force, chaired by Mr Ban, will be made up of the heads of UN agencies and the World Bank.

It will explore both emergency and long-term measures to tackle the crisis caused by the recent sharp rise in the price of staple foods such as wheat.

Unprecedented challenge

"We consider that the dramatic escalation in food prices worldwide has evolved into an unprecedented challenge of global proportions that has become a crisis for the world's most vulnerable, including the urban poor," the UN said in a statement after a meeting of agency heads in the Swiss capital Berne.

"The challenge is having multiple effects with its most serious impact unfolding as a crisis for the most vulnerable," it went on.

The UN believes 100 million people are going short of food, and the World Food Programme says it will need an extra $755m (£380m) this year to cope with the rising number of people it needs to feed.