Food aid is unloaded from a World Food Programme vessel at in Beirut, Lebanon in Sept.
The World Food Program was awarded the 2020 Nobel Peace Prize for its efforts to combat hunger, particularly in conflict zones.
The organization is being honored “for its contribution to bettering conditions for peace in conflict-affected areas and for acting as a driving force in efforts to prevent the use of hunger as a weapon of war and conflict,” the Norwegian Nobel Committee said on Friday.
The need for international solidarity and multilateral cooperation is “more conspicuous than ever,” the committee said. The World Food Program is the world’s biggest humanitarian group to specifically address hunger and to work toward food security, it said.
Last year, the World Food Program helped close to 100 million people in 88 countries in the face of acute food insecurity and hunger. The WFP is also the main body through which the United Nations works toward eradicating hunger as one of the Sustainable Development Goals.
The committee chose to highlight hunger in this year’s peace prize after a deterioration in circumstances over recent years. In 2019, 135 million people suffered from acute hunger, the highest number in many years, it said. Most of the increase was caused by war and armed conflict.
Annual prizes for achievements in physics, chemistry, medicine, peace and literature were established in the will of Alfred Nobel, the Swedish inventor of dynamite, who died in 1896. The prize in economic sciences was added by Sweden’s central bank in 1968.
Last year’s peace prize went to Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed for his work to end almost two decades of conflict with neighboring Eritrea.
Previous laureates include Mother Teresa, Nelson Mandela, Barack Obama, Martin Luther King and the European Union.
The Nobel Foundation announced last month it was increasing the amount awarded for individual prizes to 10 million kronor ($1.1 million), from 9 million kronor previously, to reflect a rise in the returns generated on its capital.
-Bloomberg
