Billions for Iraq war seen squeezing food aid

By Missy Ryan

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The cost of the Iraq war is squeezing funding for U.S. global food aid programs and threatens to exacerbate hunger just as soaring prices are hitting the world's poor, former U.S. presidential contender George McGovern said on Tuesday.

McGovern, a special envoy for the U.N. food aid agency, is pressing U.S. lawmakers to guarantee funds for child nutrition programs that are part of an agriculture bill making its way through Congress.

The former Democratic senator from South Dakota said mandatory funding for the McGovern-Dole program -- which sends U.S. crops to poor schoolchildren overseas -- would sail through Congress were it not for the hundreds of billions of dollars being poured into Iraq.

"If we didn't have this war going in Iraq, this thing would be a piece of cake. They could drop that much money through the cracks every lunch hour at the Pentagon," McGovern told Reuters.

With the price tag of the Iraq war, five years on, around $500 billion, economists say the conflict is compounding a national debt that already tops $9 trillion. Some see Iraq costing up to $3 trillion in the long run.

Food aid from the United States, the world's top donor, is a prominent issue as governments and aid groups strive to ensure that aid is not decimated by skyrocketing prices for grains, oilseeds and fuel.

After global food prices jumped by nearly 40 percent last year, the World Food Program has been forced to canvass donors for $500 million in last-minute donations.

CUTTING BACK ON MEALS