Amartya Sen favours right to food for all

Nobel laureate Amartya Sen has stressed on the need for a firm recognition of the right to food and a comprehensive legislation to guarantee it to everybody.

During the Eighth Kolkata Group Workshop, chaired by Sen and attended by people from different walks of life, the nobel laureate argued for creating durable legal entitlements that guarantee the right to food in the country.

"A Right to Food Act covering justiciable food entitlements should be non-discriminatory and universal. Entitlements  guaranteed by the Act should include food grains from the Public Distribution System, school meals, nutrition services for children below the age of six years, social security provision, and allied programmes," a statement by the Group said.

It said the legislation should recognise that food and nutritional security depends not just on food but on a set of related interventions that promote women's health, nutrition, safe drinking water, proper sanitation and healthcare.

Over 50 participants from different walks of life -- policy makers, opinion leaders, social scientists, scholars, activists and development experts had met in Kolkata on February 15 and 16 to discuss dimensions of "injustice" relating to elementary education, food security, health, women's work and non-discrimination.