Food Prices Hit Record High
By Julia Kollewe
03 February, 2011
Guardian.co.uk
World food prices surged to a fresh record high in January for the seventh consecutive month.
The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation in Rome said its food price index averaged 230.7 points last month and was up 3.4% from December, marking the highest level since the organisation started measuring food prices in 1990. It topped the high of 224.1 hit in June 2008.
All food commodity prices showed strong gains last month, except meat, which remained unchanged.
"The new figures clearly show that the upward pressure on world food prices is not abating," said FAO economist and grains expert Abdolreza Abbassian. "These high prices are likely to persist in the months to come. High food prices are of major concern especially for low-income food deficit countries that may face problems in financing food imports and for poor households which spend a large share of their income on food."
He added: "The only encouraging factor so far stems from a number of countries, where – due to good harvests – domestic prices of some of the food staples remain low compared to world prices."
Cereal prices were up 3% from December and the highest since July 2008, but still 11% below their peak in April 2008. The recent rises in wheat prices are one factor that triggered the growing unrest in Egypt, and the recent protests in Tunisia. Egypt is the world's largest wheat importer.
Oil and oil seeds costs rose 5.6%, close to the June 2008 record level, while dairy prices gained 6.2% from December and sugar prices were 5.4% higher.
By contrast, meat prices were steady as falling meat prices in Europe, caused by a drop in consumer confidence following recent feed contamination scandals, were offset by a slight increase in export prices from Brazil and the US.
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