CARACAS, April 26 (Xinhua) -- The number of malnourished people has risen in the last 10 years in Central America and the Caribbean while the figure has dropped in most parts of the world, a top UN agency official said on Wednesday.

    There were 52 million undernourished people in the world in the period between 2001 and 2003, down from 59 million in the 1990-1992 period, said Jacque Diouf, director general of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), at a regional FAO conference in Caracas.

    Meanwhile, the figure rose to 14.1 million from 12.7 million inthe Central America and Caribbean region, he said.

    Diouf called on the region to redouble its efforts to meet the UN's millennium development goals of halving the number of undernourished people in the world by 2015, which was endorsed at the World Food Summit 10 years ago in Rome.

    He said that economic growth rates in Latin America and the Caribbean region were favorable for reducing hunger. The region registered a 3.8-percent growth in 2005, and 5.9 percent in 2004. Enditem