TEGUCIGALPA, July 30.- In an effort to guarantee regional food security, representatives of the 18 Petrocaribe member countries are meeting in Honduras as of Wednesday for a ministerial level summit on agriculture. A newly created Petrocaribe Food Fund will begin with some US $500 million, reported Prensa Latina.

The initiative came from Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to help reactivate the agricultural sectors of the countries that benefit from the discount oil sold to them by Venezuela and seeks to increase the supply of basic grains and compensate for the high food prices.

The bulk of the start-up funds will come from Venezuelan oil exports at a rate of five cents for each barrel of crude oil sold.

The participants in the Petrocaribe agriculture summit will also create a Council of Ministers of Agriculture to define procedures, statutes and regulations. At the end of the meetings, an official statement is expected to explain the accords reached.

The Agriculture ministers agreed that the food crisis, worsened by skyrocketing oil prices, will not be resolved until the developed nations change their current policies.

Attending the gathering are delegations from Petrocaribe member nations Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Belize, Cuba, Dominica, Grenada, Guatemala, Guyana, Haití, Honduras, Jamaica, Nicaragua, República Dominicana, San Cristóbal y Nieves, Santa Lucía, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Surinam and Venezuela. Attending as observers are representatives from Bolivia, Costa Rica and Ecuador.