Threat to global food supply
Unfair bilateral trade agreements and development policies in the European Union and the United States have laid the foundations for global food insecurity, say Catholics
As the world's population approaches ten billion, climate change, growing scarcity of oil and the availability of quality land and water are challenging the planet's capacity to produce enough food for everyone.
World cereal prices hit record highs in 2007 and the first half of 2008, fuelling spikes in food prices which in turn triggered riots in some developed countries, along with a series of commodity export bans. Since then, prices have fallen again due to a good harvest in 2008.
Developing countries which are net importers of food were hit hardest by the hike in food prices, while net food exporting countries were making large profits. However, it is argued that in the long term, rising food prices could help rural communities in some developing countries to escape poverty through increased farmer income.
"Policies enacted by the United States and the European Union, and aggressively pushed through global institutions over the last several decades laid the ground for the ongoing food crisis," argues a new reportPdf external published by the International alliance of Catholic development agencies (CIDSE) and the Institute for Agriculture Policy (IATP).
"While both the EU and the US promote global markets as a source of stable food supply for all "they have used their controlling role in the Bretton Woods Institutions (BWIs) [The World Bank and the International Monetary Fund] to advance policies in their own interests", the authors write.
