Europe needs to make good on its pledge to donate $3.8 billion to increase food security in the developing world, says a new report published yesterday.

Eight of the world’s richest nations pledged $22.5bn to help combat hunger at a summit in L’Aquila, Italy, last year. But some nations, including those in Europe, have been slow to put their money where their mouth is.

“To date not all of the pledges have been realised,” says the report, launched at a meeting in the House of Commons.

The Montpellier Panel Report was chaired by Gordon Conway, professor of international development at Imperial College London, and former chief scientist at the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID).

Some of the pledged funds have been received, including a total of $900 million from the US, Canada, Spain, Ireland, the Republic of Korea and the Bill and Melinda gates Foundation.

But Conway told the meeting, “It’s not clear where the money is from the EU nations”.

The report urges European donors to up their game, in particular to “commit more resources, and work more closely together to align and coordinate their actions”.

It calls on Europe to follow the US approach and invest in priorities identified by African governments, including regional research programmes, rather than focusing on EU priorities.

African countries have made good progress in developing national agricultural strategies and investing in infrastructure, including research, to secure their future food production, the report adds.

“Africa is organised and ready for business,” says Lindiwe Sibanda, chief executive of the Food, Agriculture and Natural Resources Policy Analysis Network (FANRPAN) and one of the report’s authors.

Responding to the findings, a representative from DFID to the meeting that the department plans told allocate £1.1bn over the next three years to the cause, and by March next year will know which initiatives it will invest the money in.