VOA标准英语2010年-Farmers in 5 Nations Receive Funds Fro

Five nations will receive the first grants from a new fund aimed at helping¹ developing-world farms like this one in Haiti.

Five nations will receive the first grants from a new and unusual fund aimed at helping developing-world farmers.

Bangladesh, Haiti, Rwanda, Sierra Leone and Togo will receive a total of $224 million from the Global Agriculture and Food Security Program, a new World Bank-administered fund set up following a pledge by leaders of the Group of 8 countries last year to commit more development aid to agriculture.

Advocates praise the new fund, but say not all of the G8 nations are living up to their pledges.

Food price crisis

When G8 leaders met in L'Aquila, Italy, last July, the 2008 food price crisis was fresh in their minds. High prices for staple² foods had pushed more than 100 million people into poverty and hunger and triggered riots in several countries.

Led by the Obama administration, the G8 pledged $22 billion to boost food production in developing countries. Last September, in Pittsburgh, the G20 called for a fund to be set up at the World Bank to channel some of that pledge.

The five grants announced this week are the first to come from that fund.

'Making good on promises'

"It is...the first real and strong signal that the international community is serious," says Navtej Dhillon, senior advisor³ with the U.S. Treasury⁴ Department. "It's about some of the donors⁶ making good on their promises."

The donors are an unusual group. It includes G8 members the United States and Canada, but also Spain and South Korea, as well as the private foundation of software tycoon⁷ Bill Gates.

And it's not just the donors that are unusual. The funds are administered by the World Bank, and program manager Christopher Delgado says there is an unusual amount of coordination⁸ among the donors and with the recipient⁹ countries.

Country-led

"It's not just an individual donor⁵ showing up one day and saying to the minister, 'Gee¹⁰, what can we do for you today?" he says. "Or, worse, in some cases, 'Gee, we've got something we'd like to do and we hope you agree.'"

Delgado says countries come up with their own plans to help farmers, after consulting with civil society groups and the private sector¹¹. They put up some of their own money. Outside experts review the proposals. And the countries collect data to measure whether their programs are working.

"This is a tough economic time for a lot of people, including in the donor countries," he says, "and if we're going to be spending money, we really have to show that we're achieving results."

David Beckmann, president of the charity group Bread for the World, says, "What they are planning to do is just excellent...The broad plans are right. The donor countries are trying to be receptive to what the recipient countries want. The idea of investing in poor farmers is right on track."

Other G8 countries lagging

Beckmann praises the Obama administration for its leadership on the issue, and says Canada, the United Kingdom, and the European Union are living up to the commitments they made in L'Aquila last year.

But as G8 leaders meet again in Canada this week, critics say not all of them can make that claim.

The advocacy group Oxfam says Italy, France, and the Netherlands counted existing funds as their part of the $22 billion pledge. And although the group praises the United States for putting forward new money, the group's David Waskow says, "It appears as though there's some double-counting going on, and the U.S. is counting the same pot of funds both to its L'Aquila commitments from the G8 last year and toward its Copenhagen commitments on climate."

Others point out that even $22 billion would be far less than what is needed to meet the goal nations set for themselves to cut hunger and extreme poverty in half by 2015. But there is broad agreement that it's a step in the right direction after agriculture worldwide suffered decades of neglect.

 

1 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。

2 staple   

n.主要产物，常用品，主要要素，原料，订书钉，钩环；adj.主要的，重要的；vt.分类

参考例句：

• Tea is the staple crop here.本地产品以茶叶为大宗。
• Potatoes are the staple of their diet.土豆是他们的主要食品。

3 advisor   

n.顾问，指导老师，劝告者

参考例句：

• They employed me as an advisor.他们聘请我当顾问。
• The professor is engaged as a technical advisor.这位教授被聘请为技术顾问。

4 treasury   

n.宝库；国库，金库；文库

参考例句：

• The Treasury was opposed in principle to the proposals.财政部原则上反对这些提案。
• This book is a treasury of useful information.这本书是有价值的信息宝库。

5 donor   

n.捐献者；赠送人；(组织、器官等的)供体

参考例句：

• In these cases,the recipient usually takes care of the donor afterwards.在这类情况下，接受捐献者以后通常会照顾捐赠者。
• The Doctor transplanted the donor's heart to Mike's chest cavity.医生将捐赠者的心脏移植进麦克的胸腔。

6 donors   

n.捐赠者( donor的名词复数 )；献血者；捐血者；器官捐献者

参考例句：

• Please email us to be removed from our active list of blood donors. 假如你想把自己的名字从献血联系人名单中删去，请给我们发电子邮件。
• About half this amount comes from individual donors and bequests. 这笔钱大约有一半来自个人捐赠及遗赠。 来自《简明英汉词典》

7 tycoon   

n.有钱有势的企业家，大亨

参考例句：

• The tycoon is on the verge of bankruptcy.那名大亨濒临破产的边缘。
• The tycoon has many servants to minister to his needs.那位大亨有很多人服侍他。

8 coordination   

n.协调，协作

参考例句：

• Gymnastics is a sport that requires a considerable level of coordination.体操是一项需要高协调性的运动。
• The perfect coordination of the dancers and singers added a rhythmic charm to the performance.舞蹈演员和歌手们配合得很好，使演出更具魅力。

9 recipient   

a.接受的,感受性强的 n.接受者,感受者,容器

参考例句：

• Please check that you have a valid email certificate for each recipient. 请检查是否对每个接收者都有有效的电子邮件证书。
• Colombia is the biggest U . S aid recipient in Latin America. 哥伦比亚是美国在拉丁美洲最大的援助对象。

10 gee   

n.马；int.向右！前进！，惊讶时所发声音；v.向右转

参考例句：

• Their success last week will gee the team up.上星期的胜利将激励这支队伍继续前进。
• Gee,We're going to make a lot of money.哇！我们会赚好多钱啦！

11 sector   

n.部门，部分；防御地段，防区；扇形

参考例句：

• The export sector will aid the economic recovery. 出口产业将促进经济复苏。
• The enemy have attacked the British sector.敌人已进攻英国防区。