According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) in Rome, global wheat production is expected to fall 5.2% in 2012 and yields from many other crops grown to feed animals could be 10% down on last year. Prices for wheat have already risen 25% in 2012, maize 13% and dairy prices rose 7% just last month. Food reserves, [held to provide a buffer against rising prices] are at a critical low level.The 2012 global grain harvest in total is expected to be 2,236m tonnes, compared with 2,309m tonnes in 2011, a drop of about three per cent, but this is about four per cent in per capita terms, as 80m people per year are being added to the world population. As a result, corn prices hit eight dollars a bushel in August, the highest level ever recorded.
The US government is expected to announce that drought and heat damage to crops this year has reduced its wheat, maize and soy harvests by more than 10%. Because the US is by far the world's biggest grower and exporter of grains, this is expected to have repercussions around the world. The maize harvest is expected to be the lowest in nine years.
British supermarkets said they were struggling to keep shelves stocked with fresh produce and the National Farmers Union (NFU) reported that UK wheat yields have been the lowest since the late 1980s as a result of abnormal rain fall. Farmers are down 25% to 30% on the wheat crop. British supermarkets said they had not ruled out the prospect of price rises of staple foods. New research by the consumer group Which? found that the average cost of a shopping bill is now £76.83 a week – an increase of £5.66 in a year. Which? found more of us are shopping at discount supermarkets and four in 10 people told us they planned to cut back on their food shopping. The charity FareShare shows that lower-income families have cut their consumption of fruit and vegetables by nearly a third in the wake of the recession and rising food prices, to just over half of the five-a-day portions recommended for a healthy diet.
While our food bills will rise, in the developing world the consequences will be disastrous. The sheer number of people in the developing world who can no longer afford to eat every day has appalled humanitarian workers. Families in poorer countries are being forced to schedule "food-free days" each week, according to Lester Brown, president of the Washington-based Earth Policy Institute, and the most respected environmental observer of food and agricultural trends. "We have not seen this before, where a family systematically schedules days where they do not eat, when they know they can't buy enough every day so they decide at the beginning of the week, this week we won't eat on Wednesday or we won't eat on Saturday," Brown said. Foodless days were now a part of life for up to 24 per cent of families in India, 27 per cent in Nigeria, and 14 per cent in Peru.
The world's least developed countries have gone from being small net exporters of agricultural goods to huge net importers. The shift came when structural reforms in the 1980s forced indebted developing country governments to open their economies to agricultural imports while reducing their support for domestic farmers. The result: a flood of cheap and often-subsidised imports from rich countries, forcing local farmers out of business and off the land. Guatemala, for example, saw its import dependence in corn grow from 9 per cent in the early 1990s to around 40 per cent today. It is devastating for a country in which nearly half of children under five are malnourished. This in a corn-producing country, the birthplace of domesticated corn.
In many parts of the world food is grown for human consumption, serving as the staple grain for some one billion people worldwide. It is also a key feed for livestock, giving it another direct link to the human food supply through meat, dairy and egg prices.But nearly 40% of all US maize is now used in biofuels, further restricting exports and raising prices, pushing up corn prices up to 21 per cent. So much food and land is now diverted to produce fuel, corn and sugar for ethanol, soybeans, palm oil and a variety of other plants for biodiesel. It's time we put food before fuel and people before cars.
Taken from here , here and here
The US government is expected to announce that drought and heat damage to crops this year has reduced its wheat, maize and soy harvests by more than 10%. Because the US is by far the world's biggest grower and exporter of grains, this is expected to have repercussions around the world. The maize harvest is expected to be the lowest in nine years.
British supermarkets said they were struggling to keep shelves stocked with fresh produce and the National Farmers Union (NFU) reported that UK wheat yields have been the lowest since the late 1980s as a result of abnormal rain fall. Farmers are down 25% to 30% on the wheat crop. British supermarkets said they had not ruled out the prospect of price rises of staple foods. New research by the consumer group Which? found that the average cost of a shopping bill is now £76.83 a week – an increase of £5.66 in a year. Which? found more of us are shopping at discount supermarkets and four in 10 people told us they planned to cut back on their food shopping. The charity FareShare shows that lower-income families have cut their consumption of fruit and vegetables by nearly a third in the wake of the recession and rising food prices, to just over half of the five-a-day portions recommended for a healthy diet.
While our food bills will rise, in the developing world the consequences will be disastrous. The sheer number of people in the developing world who can no longer afford to eat every day has appalled humanitarian workers. Families in poorer countries are being forced to schedule "food-free days" each week, according to Lester Brown, president of the Washington-based Earth Policy Institute, and the most respected environmental observer of food and agricultural trends. "We have not seen this before, where a family systematically schedules days where they do not eat, when they know they can't buy enough every day so they decide at the beginning of the week, this week we won't eat on Wednesday or we won't eat on Saturday," Brown said. Foodless days were now a part of life for up to 24 per cent of families in India, 27 per cent in Nigeria, and 14 per cent in Peru.
The world's least developed countries have gone from being small net exporters of agricultural goods to huge net importers. The shift came when structural reforms in the 1980s forced indebted developing country governments to open their economies to agricultural imports while reducing their support for domestic farmers. The result: a flood of cheap and often-subsidised imports from rich countries, forcing local farmers out of business and off the land. Guatemala, for example, saw its import dependence in corn grow from 9 per cent in the early 1990s to around 40 per cent today. It is devastating for a country in which nearly half of children under five are malnourished. This in a corn-producing country, the birthplace of domesticated corn.
In many parts of the world food is grown for human consumption, serving as the staple grain for some one billion people worldwide. It is also a key feed for livestock, giving it another direct link to the human food supply through meat, dairy and egg prices.But nearly 40% of all US maize is now used in biofuels, further restricting exports and raising prices, pushing up corn prices up to 21 per cent. So much food and land is now diverted to produce fuel, corn and sugar for ethanol, soybeans, palm oil and a variety of other plants for biodiesel. It's time we put food before fuel and people before cars.
Taken from here , here and here
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