Progress at Hot Springs
In spite of the slightly hostile attitude adopted by the officials of the Food Conference at Hot Springs towards the Press enough is known about the work of the conference to indicate that so far at any rate the discussions have gone extremely well. The delegates have not been afraid of bold plans, and the proposals they are expected to lay before their governments constitute a constructive and comprehensive programme which, if adopted, will go far to realising one at least of President Roosevelt's four freedoms, Freedom from Want. What is required first is international agreement on minimum subsistence standards, then the organisation of agricultural production (and distribution) everywhere to provide a diet up to those standards, and the creation of a permanent international food organisation to promote and regulate joint action for the attainment of the agreed objects. But the conference has gone farther than that, and rightly. There can, it recognises, be no Freedom from Want till there is Freedom from Fear—from that fear which causes nations to raise trade barriers, for their imagined security, so that the necessary exchange of goods and services is fatally impeded ; that is profoundly true, as President Roosevelt no doubt fully realised when he formulated his "four freedoms." The delegates at Hot Springs have shown themselves capable of taking large views and expressing them in an essentially practical programme. The spirit that has animated this first United Nations conference is of admirable omen for the future.
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