Food Prices: the other tangible effect of peak oil
In response to a recent post on this blog about gas & diesel prices, a reader from Argentina commented that a growing number of farmers there were unable to work the fields due to prohibitively high gas & diesel prices for their machinery. The global influx in prices is not only affecting the agriculture of Argentina, but the entire world. And as the UN agency for Food & Agriculture (FAO) recently warned: World food prices are rising “at an alarming rate” and will rise to levels reached only once previously – during the summer of 2008 – coinciding exactly with the historic oil price spike of $147.
Below, excerpts from the FAO website:
International community must be aware of possibility of even higher food prices in 2011
In the latest edition of its Food Outlook report, the agency also issued a warning to the international community to prepare for harder times ahead unless production of major food crops increases significantly in 2011.
Food import bills for the world’s poorest countries are predicted to rise 11 percent in 2010 and by 20 percent for low-income food-deficit countries.
This means, by passing a trillion dollars, the global import food bill will likely rise to a level not seen since food prices peaked at record levels in 2008.
