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Developed nations should not blame the developing countries for the rising demand for food and the surge in food prices across the globe, China's top agricultural official said Wednesday.
Minister of Agriculture Sun Zhengcai said that as a developing nation, China has contributed greatly to world food security by providing for nearly a quarter of the world's population.
Some developed countries have blamed developing countries, including India and China, for the global food crisis.
"The surge in food prices has been caused by multiple factors," Sun told the high-level conference on World Food Security, which began in Rome on Tuesday.
He blamed rising crude prices, climate change and speculation for the food crisis.
"It's not right to attribute the growing demand for food worldwide to the growth of developing countries or to specific policies of some countries."
The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) is hosting the three-day summit at a time when the world is experiencing a dramatic rise in food price.
Food security is facing a threat from non-traditional sources, too, such as biofuels. More and more food products, especially corn, are being used to make biofuels, and this has the potential of creating more far-reaching problems.
A report jointly issued by the FAO and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development recently said the major reason behind the surging food prices is the increase in biofuel production by some developed countries.
Sun said China has succeeded in providing for its 1.3 billion people mostly from its domestic production. "And it has the capability to ensure long-term food security from domestic production."
Thanks to its preferential agricultural policy, the country has reaped a bumper harvest in the last four years, with its production crossing 500 million tons last year.
China is committed to contributing to world food production and agriculture. "The country is using its expertise in agriculture, such as cultivating hybrid rice, to help other developing countries to increase their food production," he said.
(China Daily June 5, 2008)
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Here at WUFYS, we have not only interesting news, educating articles, but also smart people who shed light on the WHYs and HOWs of world events.
The "global food crisis" that we hear everyday, must have some "reason" behind it --- most people wonder --- but what?!!!
Here I offer several reasons. I know I am forgetting something, but that's where you the readers come in. Together let's brainstorm and sort out this enigma.
1) Firstly, there is NO food shortage. There is AMPLE amount of food. Heck we can even distribute it to the starving people of the world (IF we wanted to).
2) If there's no food crisis, why are the prices sky-rocketing?!!!
That's the key, 1) is the truth, 2) is the "effect". To understand this "crisis" we need to understand different people......
...... to be continued.
(I apologize if I am unable to finish this. I will continue to actively contribute to WUFYS, but if you do not hear from me for "months" then you know something is not right....)
Submitted by The Great Revealer on Thu, 2008-06-05 06:44
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There is indeed a global food shortage, but it’s not caused by “shortages.” Humans grow more food now than ever before.
Likewise, there’s a surplus of oil. Brimming oil tankers are presently sitting off the coasts of Iran and Louisiana. The Strategic Petroleum Reserve has been filled. Demand is flat. The world's biggest consumer of energy (guess who?) is cutting back. At a time when gas prices are at an all-time high, Americans have curtailed their driving at a historic rate. The Department of Transportation said figures from March show the steepest decrease in driving ever recorded.
Meanwhile Index Speculators have now stockpiled, via the futures market, 1.1 billion barrels of petroleum, effectively adding eight times as much oil to their own stockpile as the United States has added to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve over the last five years.
Supplies of crude are so plentiful, according to the Wall Street Journal, that “traders of physical crude oil say their market is suffering from too much supply, not too little.”
Iran, for instance, is storing 25 million barrels of heavy, sour crude oil because, in the words of Hossein Kazempour Ardebili, Iran’s oil governor, “there are simply no buyers because the market has more than enough oil.”
The great oil and food crunch is a real crisis, but it’s a fabricated crisis; another "smoke and mirrors" fiasco; another Enron-type shellgame engineered by banksters and hedge fund managers.
#ff0000">SO WHAT CAUSED THIS NIGHTMARE?
Quite simply, the trading of food and oil used to be regulated to prevent such crises, but bankers and speculators managed to get trading completely de-regulated so they could play in a global casino. The speculators are getting RICH. After the sub-prime meltdown, their new “bubble” is food and oil.
Here’s how the speculators drive prices sky-high…
US margin rules of the government's Commodity Futures Trading Commission allow speculators to buy a crude oil futures contract on the Nymex, by having to pay only 6% of the value of the contract. This means that at today's price of $135 per barrel, a futures trader only has to put up about $8 for every barrel. The trader borrows the other $120, knowing he will make enough profit to cover the loan, and then some.
This extreme "leverage" of 16 to 1 drives prices up, and up, and up. Oil was at $50 a barrel in January 2007, then $75 a barrel in August 2007. Now it’s $130 or so a barrel. Same with food prices.
None of this has anything to do with physical supply and demand.
The speculators include hedge funds, and banks that want to offset their subprime mortgage losses. These are the exact same thieves who profited from the mortgage bubble, and caused the meltdown.
As more and more money pours into the markets, it causes the markets to expand, which sucks in more money, which causes further expansion, round and round. The more feverish the casino, the more feverish it becomes. During the last five years, speculative activity in commodity markets has grown by 20-fold – from $13 billion in 2003 to $260 billion now.
Meanwhile the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (which is supposed to prevent all this) is working hard to pump up the fever to even greater heights. It has taken steps to allow certain speculators unlimited access to the commodities futures markets, and is pressing to make "Index Speculators exempt from all position limits" so they can make "unlimited" bets on the futures. This is wreaking havoc on the global economy, and pushing millions of people toward starvation.
In short, food and energy markets are controlled by hedge funds and speculators who artificially manipulate the numbers for their own benefit.
That is, the current market is being rigged by companies and speculators who are jacking up prices for their own greed.
#ff0000">CAN WE RESTORE SANITY?
Yes, if we could re-apply the same regulations we had before.
Unfortunately the people who are getting rich have enough money to buy any politician, and thus prevent any regulations from ever being imposed on their casino again.
The world is headed for a meltdown of titanic proportions.
You post on energy and commodity futures manipulation was as good as I've seen anywhere.
The ENRON exemption is the problem, and it's potentially another bubble waiting for a pin.