CANBERRA—Australia will provide at least $180 million in the next four years to global food programs, its largest ever commitment.
An agreement signed in Canberra on Monday includes $10 million a year for school meals programs in Southeast Asia, Africa and possibly South America.
The deal was brokered after talks between Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and UN World Food Program boss Josette Sheeran during the L'Aquila G8 meetings in July.
Australia's commitment is a breakthrough for the UN agency, which relies on annual commitments for most of its funding.
"Less than four per cent of our money is predictable or multi-year," Ms Sheeran told reporters ahead of the signing.
"Typically, for three months from now we won't know how much money we're going to have."
The agency aims to develop more "predictability" in the funding it receives from nations, and the four-year agreement with Australia is a first.
Australia will also provide support in the event of emergencies, such as the $2 million it gave for typhoon victims in the Philippines.
Ms Sheeran, who had flown in from the Philippines, said Australia was one of the first countries to respond to the UN's emergency response there.
"They're not out of the woods," she said of the typhoon victims, adding food security for several million people was still at risk.
The Philippines food bowl had lost its second harvest, and many farmers would not be able to plant a third food crop.
"So we expect that there will be very high, urgent humanitarian needs for the next six months," Ms Sheeran said.
With natural disasters occurring at a rate four times higher than 20 years ago, relief programs are under pressure.
In the 1980s, 80 per cent of the agency's work focused on long-term development and 20 per cent on emergencies, Ms Sheeran said.
Now the majority of its work was responding to natural disasters.
During the past decade Australia has provided more than $850 million to the agency's food aid operations.
