Tag: food prices

 You’ve all seen the headlines: Gas prices are headed for record highs and inflation is tame.

How do you reconcile the two?

 Most people fall back to blaming “speculators”. But if that sounds like an over-simplified cop-out, its because it is.

 To blame rising prices on speculators is like blaming getting hurt on crashing your car.  While its true you got hurt in a car crash, you don’t respond by outlawing car crashes, or in this case, speculators. It would be useless to do either.

 Instead, you outlaw the reason why the car crashed. For instance, outlaw poorly-made brakes.

  When it comes to rising energy prices, you look at why there are so many darn speculators.

  It now seems likely to be one of the most tragic and inevitable global trends for 2011: food riots.

 People are burning stores in India, Chili, China, Egypt, and Algeria.

 The recent overthrow of the Tunisian dictator was about a lot of things, including corruption and unemployment, but it was also about food prices too. Protest signs in Tunis included examples like, “WE WANT bread and water and no Ben Ali.” Some protesters waved loaves of bread to emphasize their point.

 Food price protests have spread even to oil-rich Oman.

 Meanwhile, governments are taking desperate measures in the face of soaring prices.

 India has banned the export of onions after vegetable prices have risen 70% in the past year. China is implementing price controls and building up a strategic supply of foodstuffs. South Korea is lowering import tariffs on food. Many arab governments are resorting to tax cuts and hand-outs to defer popular protests.

 The scary thing is that everyone expects food prices to keep increasing.

 Beef and pork prices are at record highs, but, if forecasts prove accurate, consumers have only just begun to see higher prices for food and fuel.

  Steady increases in the costs of grain and energy since last fall are drawing comparisons to the summer of 2008, when corn and soybean prices set a record and gasoline topped $4 a gallon, said Purdue University farm economist Chris Hurt.

  Unlike in 2008, however, grain prices are up before the first seeds go into the ground, and fuel costs are rising well ahead of the spring-summer driving season.

 The key question is “why”? Why is food price inflation suddenly so high?

  On the day after world’s price of food hit an all-time high, violence erupted in the streets of Algiers.

ALGIERS, Algeria – Riots over rising food prices and chronic unemployment spiraled out from Algeria’s capital on Thursday, with youths torching government buildings and shouting “Bring us Sugar!”

At no time since records have been kept has the cost of eating been so expensive. The last time prices were this high there were food riots in 32 nations, and that has some people worried.

 “We are entering danger territory,” said the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation’s chief economist, Abdolreza Abbassian.

  Global food prices have risen for the sixth month in succession. Wheat has almost doubled since June, sugar is at a 30-year high, and pork is up by a quarter since the beginning of 2010.

(The following was cross posted from Economic Populist and Venomopolis.)

I’m a sucker for barbecues, especially good ones.  Normally I’m not a “family” person, but I am a people person.  When it comes to barbecues, though I tend to even go to the ones my family puts out.  This year I hosted, unfortunately the weather was not on my side and being someone into risk management I decided to hold an “indoor bbq.”  The food, as always, was good, but my other type of appetite was also satisfied, my hunger for news and tid bits

The contrarian in me is screaming that Reuters’ recent piece on food prices is the food inflation equivalent to Businessweek’s famous “Stocks are dead” headline from a 1982 issue.  Yet another piece is whispering in my hear “baby, it ain’t over yet!”  

Guess what?  The media has caught on!  Sure, a couple of years after those of us that have been paying attention already knew the answer, but HEY! at least they decided to report on it.  Only because it helps corporate interests, but they did finally report on it.  

Go figure.

What, you ask, did they finally uncover?  The reason your food is costing more money!  WHOA!  Be still, my bank account.

From a story, issued from MSNBC late Friday afternoon.

If you’re fuming about how high gasoline prices have gotten, why not relax with a nice meal?

Perhaps a few beers and a turkey sandwich? Maybe a chicken Caesar salad?

Well, it’s not just the price of gasoline that’s going up. That beer, turkey and chicken are also costing more too.

Let me see.  What do beer, turkey and chicken have in common?  

Hmmmmmm.  Nope, I can’t figure it out for myself. It must be too obvious or something…

As President Bush noted in his comments on the economy Friday, “Prices are up at the gas pump and in the supermarket.”

Welp, I wonder how that happened on Your Watch, oh enlightened Presnit?  

Lets see, shall we?