If you've been concerned with wildfires and threats to our coastal ecosystems,
food price spikes and other climate impacts, THIS IS THE TIME TO SPEAK UP!
This report describes a new age of growing crisis:
food price spikes and oil price hikes, devastating weather events, financial meltdowns, and global contagion.
US picked it up, why OUR
food prices spiked last year.)
The UN's Food and Agriculture Organization has launched a new online tool to track food prices in 55 developing countries, as part of
its food price spike response.
These phenomena have been among the main reasons for the growing food shortage and
food price spikes,» says Reimund Rötter, a research professor at MTT Agrifood Research Finland.
Today, the House Energy and Commerce Committee should be holding a hearing on advancing America's, and the world's, energy future by initiating a sustained quest to break the economic shackles imposed by enduring dependence on oil (that doesn't involve using 40 percent of our corn crop to produce ethanol in a world facing
food price spikes).
Given that scenario, which I think is accurate, the short answer to your question is that
the food price spikes we see now are only a dim pretext to what is to come — unless we make some major design changes in our food system.
I see absolutely no reason that
this food price spike is any different from any of the ones in the last four decades: ie, a normal self - correcting phenomenon in which a slight imbalance between demand and supply is reflected in a price rise, which will result in higher output next harvest.
It may be time to do the same thing for the hybrid debate over the role of climate change in propelling
food price spikes and political instability in Egypt and other turbulent places.
This strong link began in October of 2006, and contributed to 79 % of
the food price spikes in the 2007 - 08 crisis, which left thousands of people hungry and food insecure.
«We're already facing
food price spikes and the early impacts of human - caused climate change on food production.
«A sudden
food price spike in 2008 led to food riots across parts of the world that are in danger of soon being repeated,» USAFLPB notes.
This guidance document underscores that: poor people are already at risk from climate - related shocks, including crop failures from reduced rainfall,
food prices spikes after extreme weather events, and increased incidence of diseases following heat waves and floods.
The food price spikes of 2008 brought new attention to the need for developing countries to reduce their dependence on imports and invest in their small - scale food producers.
According to 2012 data from the UN World Food Program 2012, Senegal is chronically vulnerable to natural disasters (particularly drought and flooding), its agricultural sector has declined over time, it imports about 46 % of its food requirements, its ground water tables is falling 20 feet per years in many places, and it is vulnerable to
food price spikes.
Beyond that, «more frequent and extreme weather events will compound things further, creating shortages, destabilizing markets, and precipitating
food price spikes which will be felt on top of the projected structural price rises.»
Not exact matches
After months of higher input costs for manufacturers, the simultaneous
spike in
food and oil
prices is a double whammy that is now starting to hit consumers.
U.S. packaged
food companies are facing a
spike in costs due to a dearth of drivers, new regulations and higher diesel
prices.
Food prices ought to
spike next year, which will continue to place upward pressure on inflation.
International dairy
prices are up 82 per cent from the lows of February, sparking speculation about another big
price spike, according to the
Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO).
The FAO
Food Price Index showed the first drop in March after eight months of continuous
spikes — but it may not be a sure sign that the trend is reversing.
There is a reason: forecasting a big El Niño would cause a
spike in
food prices.
Burning
food crops for power is the worst use of scarce land imaginable, and has already led to a situation where there is a direct conflict between
food and energy: a significant proportion of the
food -
price spike in 2008 (and a further
spike in early 2011), which led to widespread hunger and bread riots in many poorer countries, was driven by crops being withdrawn from international markets to produce biofuels for transport.
In 2008, constrictions in the
food supply chain led to a
spike in global
prices and riots around the world.
Just 3 years later, another
spike in
food prices contributed to the Arab Spring uprisings.
Quarantining infected people has interfered with harvests and planting, causing a
spike in
food prices.
Uber offers a
food delivery service and today JustEat, a rival, has seen a
spike in its share
price.
Not surprisingly, those
spikes in insulin levels as a result of eating highly processed
foods sweetened with unnatural sugars has come with a heavy
price.
High gas
prices make you a savvier shopper Consumers issue a collective groan when gas
prices go up because it usually translates to a
spike in
food prices, but there is a silver lining.
Just causing
food and gasoline
prices to
spike?
Food prices ought to
spike next year, which will continue to place upward pressure on inflation.
The massive international pet
food recall in 2007 led to drastic
spikes in pet
food prices (ranging from 20 % to as much as 70 %!)
Early last year, when fuel costs
spiked, pet
food prices rose dramatically.
A quest for reality behind word wars over the cause and consequences of
spiking food prices.
Keith Bradsher and Andrew Martin have a sobering story in The Times showing declines in funding for agricultural development assistance and basic research even as the world's poorest regions face
spiking prices and shortages of basic
foods.
-- this huge drought, dust storms starting up in bigger volumes again, the Pakistan flood that displaced 20 million people, the Russian drought and fires that led to the highest
spike in
food prices ever recorded — that has an impact on poor people around the world.
Adam Nossiter, «For Congo Children,
Food Today Means None Tomorrow,» New York Times, 2 January 2012; Deutsche Welthungerhilfe, IFPRI, and Concern Worldwide, 2011 Global Hunger Index: The Challenge of Hunger: Taming
Price Spikes and Excessive
Food Price Volatility (Bonn, Washington, DC; and Dublin: 2011), p. 17.
A searing heat wave struck Moscow in late June 2010, spawning massive wildfires, killing tens of thousands, and cutting Russia's wheat crop by 40 %, contributing to a sharp
spike in world
food prices.
Using corn for fuel rather than
food caused a worldwide
spike in
food prices with grievous effects on the world's poorest.
But that turned out to be not just environmentally destructive but was also arguably responsible for the
spike in
food prices that soon followed, as farmers turned away from cultivating corn for human consumption to cultivating it for ethanol production.
According to a report commissioned by the World Bank, global demand for fuels made from
food accounted for nearly 70 % of the historic
price spike in wheat, rice, corn, and soy during the summer 2008.
In a globalized world, the expansion of the biofuels industry has contributed to
spikes in
food prices and a shortage of land for
food - based agriculture in poor corners of Asia, Africa and Latin America because the raw material is grown wherever it is cheapest.
They would have to collude to fix their
prices (as the ethanol lobby always claims grocery chains do when the
price of
food spikes), which is illegal.
Then from 2010 to 2011, the
price of wheat doubled — fueled by a combination of extreme weather events linked to climate change, oil
price spikes and intensified speculation on
food commodities — impacting on Syrian wheat imports.
The revolutions recently and on - going in the ME have
food pricing as a stronger driver than any political ideology, e.g. Keep your eye on China; its power and
food shortages are
spiking; the gubmint has even resorted to actually increasing electricity
prices, much to its own chagrin and the distress of the public.
The unprecedented
spike in
food prices drove up the number of hungry people in the world to over 1 billion for the first time in 2009.
This in a week when Kentucky farmers were reporting that corn kernels were «aborting» in record heat, threatening a
spike in global
food prices.
A
spike in vegetable
prices has fanned
food inflation in India, where
prices last month were 7 percent higher than a year earlier.