Q&A: Food crisis

Q&A: Food crisis
Matthew Weaver

This article was first published on guardian.co.uk on Tuesday April 29 2008. It was last updated at 15:44 on April 29 2008.

What is happening?

Food prices have soared by more than 60% in the last year, sparking riots in some countries. The UN secretary general, Ban Ki-Moon, has warned of "social unrest on an unprecedented scale". The price of rice has risen by 68% since the start of 2008. Other staples such as wheat and corn have more than doubled since last year.

What are the consequences?

The World Bank estimates that 100 million people have been pushed into poverty by food price rises in the last two years. In Britain, rising commodity prices will mean the average family having to pay an extra £800 a year for groceries.

How serious are the food riots?

So far the worst have been in Haiti, where six people were killed and the prime minister was forced to resign, and in Cameroon, where 24 were killed. There have also been violent scenes in Egypt, Ivory Coast, South Korea and Bangladesh. In the Philippines, the government has introduced a life sentence for hoarding rice.

How is this crisis different from others?

It is becoming global, and affecting urban as well as rural areas.

Why is it happening now?

The World Food Programme blames a combination of rising demand from rapidly developing countries like China and India; the impact of climate change, including floods and droughts; and shortsighted government policies. The era of cheap food for the last 30 years has led to complacency about future supplies. Financial speculation by hedge funds trying to exploit new markets, and panic-buying by importers, are making things worse.
Export restrictions designed to protect national supplies have contributed by skewing prices. Reductions in agricultural aid to developing countries are being cited as another factor.
Switching traditional agricultural crops to biofuels has significantly cut the amount of land available for food production in high-yielding countries such as the US.

What are the possible solutions?

In the short term, the UN has called for an increase in subsidies to developing countries through the World Food Programme. In the medium and longer term, it wants to encourage more smallholder farming in developing countries to reduce their dependence on the west.
Farmers will need to produce higher yields and more unused land will have to be farmed.

Communication Misunderstanding

I talk on my experience with my friends. Actually, all communication is involved encoding and decondeing, called a sender and a receiver. Due to level of English, it leads to make confusion between two people what we intent to think and to do.

What does it mean " I am serious "? I am still in doubt why only the word "I am serious " leads to break up our friendship forever. Or it is just pretext, I think it may be. It's not just only the word make them so crazy. If they want to be crazy, please let them being crazy forever......They will sorrow forever in life.

When you know something, say what you know. When you don't know something, say that you don't know. That is knowledge. - Kung Fu Tzu (Confucius)

Food and Oil Crisis

Afther the oil crisis, now it turns to the food crisis. Which one is the most important? As to me, the food is the most important basic needs for living, while the oil is just the second machine.

The rice price is up to 50% in January 2007 , 318, 3 dollars per ton to 577 dollars in January 2008. The hardest hit will be on the Africa region where is the poor countries and depend on the food import. In the meantime, many prinicipal exporters China, India, Vietnam and Thailand stop temporarily to export for local needs and reserves. The main cause of shortages come from the high price of energy, the draught in the region and the shift of cultivation from rice to the biofuel such as corn, sugar cane and palm oil.

Soaring food prices pose problems for three groups. First, for the poor whose ability to buy is underminded. The next one is the least developed countries who depend on high import, natural disaster and political unrest. The last is for International Aid Agencies whose goal is to help the poor countries.

Khmer New Year in Ratanakiri

This Khmer New Year , I went to Rattanakiri. I am very disappointed with tourist site management. Actually , there are many places to go around, especially visiting the village of minority ethnic, waterfalls, and a big lake with a beautiful landscape surrounding. But lack of tourism destination management.

On the first day of New Year, I went to restaurant in town, there are crowds of people waiting their breakfast, and some waiting very long time to have their own meal. Some are very disappointed because no food available. One thing I made notice of restaurant is the guest come to take the meal by ownself. Then, I continued to go Pagoda in Lumphat district for traditional ceremony with family and friends. After finishing the ceremony, I went to TAT TAI is along the Sre Pok rivers with a vivid beautiful landscape. Hummmmmmmmm............

Ah I forget to tell how far it is from Ban Lung town to Lumphat. It is about 40 Km with a good road condition that can drive 60-90 km/hours. It takes me nearly 40 mns to arrive there. On the second of my new year in RTK, I went to Pagoda as usual with my father's men to celebrate it. This pagoda is very small with two middle aged monks and many clerks. The pagoda is just built two months ago. On the way back, I went to waterfall of hydroelectricity one, called CHRORS TDAM SNAE . It is very popular place for high school student come to play with their partner. Eh, too dangerous for khmer society. Is it good?????????? I don't think so. It is very bad effect on Khmer Culture. As people told me there, they often see student come to play here.

The most important thing I want to tell you here is the toursim site management is not satisfied at all . No public toilet, no dust bin, car parking.....,. Generally Speaking, the facilities is your turn to rate it.

Rice Price increase.......!

It's unbelievable that the soaring rice price hits many Asian countries. For Cambodia, government spends US $ 10 million buying rice from farmer. ( Source: The Mekong Times, April 7, 2008). Luckily, government takes a strong measure to ban temporarily on exporting rice to the neighbor countries. However, the soaring price of rice doesn't affect on Cambodia.

If the rice price increases as what the fuel does, it make very bad effect on population of the world who consuming everyday. Anyway, it makes a good profits for rural countrymen like in Cambodia.