Ireland has committed to providing a minimum of €7m a year for the next three years to the World Food Programme.

The agreement was signed at a two-day conference on global hunger and climate change at Dublin Castle.

President Michael D Higgins has opened the event saying that global hunger in the 21st century represents the grossest of human rights violations.

Ireland has also committed to continue to provide funding in response to humanitarian emergences under the three-year agreement.

A number of high-profile speakers are attending the conference today and tomorrow, including the former US Vice President Al Gore and the head of the World Food Programme Ertharin Cousin.