As the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation meets to discuss the food crisis in Rome today, debt campaigners have issued a call for a moratorium on debt repayments from afflicted countries.

British prime minister Gordon Brown today faces heavy criticism for launching his Business Call to Action on global poverty alongside corporations that have been widely attacked for deepening poverty and undermining human rights.

As the government faces criticism on its anti-poverty policies, Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams has called for more action to protect the poorest and most vulnerable from the likely consequences of an economic downturn.

Agricultural export subsidies in rich countries which destroy local food production and the income of poor farmers in the global South need to be withdrawn to alleviate the world food crisis, says ethicist and priest Christoph Stückelberger.

Christians in the US should close their churches and channel their energies into helping the poor. This is the message from the campaign 'Faith in Action', a resource developed by a number of US agencies.

While worldwide attention is focused on discord and divisions within the Anglican Communion, Anglican women and girls are uniting to make their voices heard on issues of poverty and women's empowerment through a new book of prayers.

Catholic charities in the US called yesterday for more to be done to help the estimated 35 million Americans who are impacted by hunger. At the White House they called for the strengthening of federal nutrition programs.

Faith groups in Northern Ireland and America have been seeking to learn from one another about making peace in the human and the physical environment together. Earlier this month a US interfaith group visited the province.