Food Crisis

The prices of commodity have been climbing sharply recently due to the insufficient food supply around the world and that did take a toll on people's lives, especially those people who make less than 1 dollar a day in developing countries. The US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said that no one should spend all of their daily wages just to buy their daily bread. The UN Secretary General also stressed that the world must increase its food production to ease skyrocketing prices and most of the governments are taking measures to take on the challenge.

How high are the food prices? According to the CNN report, in just one year, the price of corn has gone up 31% on global markets, and the prices of rice, soya and wheat have risen by 74%, 87%, and 130% respectively. Most of my friends have no idea where the inflation problem comes from and they are wondering why all of a sudden almost everything becomes so exenpensive. Actually, related reports have been across the media already. It all boils down to the following reasons.

1. The growing oil prices
The oil prices have hit a record high due to the high demand from the emerging countries, such as China and India. In spite of the greater demand, the OPEC (Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries) doesn't increase their production. This might lead to a potential energy crisis. In order to solve the problem, the research and developement of all kinds of alternative energy is underway. One of the popular ways to alternative new energy production is "ethanol", whcih can convert food crops into fuel. Due to the increasing production, a lot of crops have been used for this. Consequently, the food prices are going up even faster than expected.

2. Global warming and natural disasters
Global warming has become the talks of the world. And most people believe it impacts the instabilty of the global weather and has caused a lot natural disasters, such as typhoons, hurricanes, tornadoes, droughts and all that. As a result, a lot of fields have been flooded or have dried up, resulting to insufficient food production.

3. The great demand in emerging countries
Emerging countries such as India and China both have a great population. Due to their improving economy, the demand for more food is on the rise. Without the increase of the food production, this could cause a food shortage problem.

4. The exporting control in some countries
Generally speaking, when the price of something goes up, it's a great opportunity for producers to make a killing. However, it's not the case this time. On the contrary, a lot of countries limit or reduce the exporting quota of rice, wheat, corn and soya because they are afraid that their people would face the food shortage problem in the future. By keeping more food domestically, their people can be less stressed out by the price hike problem. In consequence, people in other countries can't import more food from the global market even if they can afford it. However, is the measure really good for people in exporting countries? Maybe not. For those people relying on exporting to make money, this may hurt their bottom line and lead to a no-win situation, for people in importing countries and farmers in exporting countries.

To sum up, with the soaring demand, the decline in supply, and the conversion of food to the gas tank, it adds up to the worsening food crisis problem. However, it seems that the inflation problem has no signs of letting up and the food crisis might not be sorted out in the next few months. As an ordinary guy, we can only feed ourselves with something inexpensive and cut down the consumption of gasoline in order to save more money. However, I do hope that the OPEC and the governments in developing countries can put themselves in the poor's shoes, especially those who make under 1 USD a day. Just like what the US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said, we should not let them spend all of their daily wages just for daily bread.