UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has urged nations to seize an "historic opportunity to revitalise agriculture" as a way of tackling the food crisis.Mr Ban told a UN-sponsored summit in Rome that food production would have to rise by 50% by 2030 to meet demand.
Mr Ban said export restrictions and import tariffs ought to be minimised to alleviate the crisis.
The summit comes as food costs have reached a 30-year high in real terms, causing riots in several countries.
Map showing impact of food price rises on trade balances
The host of the conference - the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) - has warned the industrialised countries that unless they increase yields, eliminate barriers and move food to where it is needed most, a global catastrophe could result.
The FAO is calling for $1.7bn of emergency funding to tackle the shortage in production.
The recent crisis is believed to have pushed 100 million people into hunger worldwide.
Poorer countries are faced with a 40% increase in their food imports bill this year, and experts say some countries' food bills have doubled in the past year.
In other developments at the summit:
Brazilian President Luis Inacio Lula da Silva defends his country's production of biofuels, saying blaming ethanol production for food price rises is an "affront"
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says the market is "full of oil" and price rises are "artificial"
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