Former EU agriculture commissioner Franz Fischler of Austria said Friday he would run for the top post at the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), in an announcement that widened the field of candidates, according to dpa. Current FAO Director-General Jacques Diouf of Senegal is scheduled to end his term in 2011. Fischler said the Rome-based organization should play a more active role in countering speculative food price bubbles. "I firmly believe that the FAO itself has to define its influence, and that it is able to do this," he told reporters. The former politician identified Assistant FAO Director-General Jose Graziano da Silva of Brazil and former Spanish foreign minister Miguel Angel Moratinos as his strongest rivals. Fischler did not comment on the fact that fielding two Europeans might lower either of the candidates' chances, but said the choice for potential European backers is between him as an agricultural politician and Moratinos as an experienced diplomat. Indroyono Soesilo of Indonesia and the Iraqi Abdul Latif Jamal Rashid are the two other official candidates for the vote in late June.
