He was speaking at the 25th observation of the World Food Day and 60 years of FAO at the forecourt of the State House in Accra yesterday. The function was on the theme: "Agriculture and Intercultural Dialogue: It's Our Common Heritage."

Mr Debrah said the machinery has been imported to "improve the quality of rice and increase the competitiveness of the locally produced rice".

He said the importation of the machinery is one of the measures taken by the government to reduce the level of hunger and ensure food security in the country.

Mr Debrah said the government has also taken steps to improve livestock production in the country. To that effect, he said the Poultry Development Board has been constituted to assist in overcoming the challenges in the poultry industry.

He said access to irrigation water has been expanded, and farmers have been supported to improve planting materials and enhance extension services to improve their practices.

He called on the developed world to assist the developing ones by providing a fair playing field in the area of trade to enhance export competitiveness and improve agriculture.

He said this year's celebration sought to highlight intercultural dialogue as a platform for promoting agricultural production and productivity that would lead to food security.

The Minister of Fisheries, Mrs Gladys Asmah, accused the developing world of paying "half hearted attention" to the development of agriculture and food security, "to the extent that we are unable to feed ourselves".

She said in the beginning of the century, about seven billion representing 42% of the world population depended on agricultural produce for their survival.

Mrs Asmah noted: "It is important for our policy makers, researchers, extension officers and other agricultural experts to liaise closely with our farmers and fishermen to exchange ideas through frequent organization of field days and other farmers' fora for increased output."

Mr Oloche A. Edache, Assistant Director-General of FAO Regional Representative for Africa, said greater effort is needed to increase the technology transfer in order to increase food production.

He tasked African leaders to restructure their national policies in favour of agriculture to promote food production and enhance national and household food security to ensure that by 2015 the number of the hungry people in the world would be reduced by half.

"Although we are still far from reaching the World Food Summit (WFS) target of at least reducing by half the number of hungry people in the world by 2015, this objective is till both attainable and affordable", he assured.

Sheikh I.C Quaye, Greater Accra Regional Minister, called on the nation's scientists and industrialists to support the agricultural sector with the appropriate technology for quality food production.