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WASHINGTON -- U.S. consumers should brace for the biggest increase in food prices in nearly 20 years in 2008 and even more pain next year due to surging meat and produce prices, the Agriculture Department said Wednesday.

Washington, D.C. (AHN) - The flood waters of Iowa has just started to recede, but America is already feeling the impact of the flood on corn prices which hit $8 a bushel on Monday. After preliminary reports of poor harvest for July delivery came out, corn price went up to $6 a bushel in late May and closed $7.325 a bushel on Monday at the Chicago Board of Trade. Corn contracts for later months even exceeded $8 and then lowered a bit at $8. Iowa, one of the largest corn and soybean producer in the U.S. was flooded by as...

Unprecedented food scarcity is beginning to dictate the rules of a new political order where individual countries are scrambling to secure their own food supplies with little concern for the rest of the world, says the founder of the Earth Policy Institute. Recent manifestations of national food insecurity like export restrictions imposed by some grain-producing countries are the troublesome portents of an "entirely new chapter in the book of food security," Lester Brown told foreign correspondents in Beijing on Tuesday. "We are in the midst of the most severe food crisis in the world's history," Brown said. "This is not...

DAYTON — Corn stalks normally dominate the fields of farmer Lyle McKanna. But this summer, leafy green soybean plants will swallow up more acreage than ever. McKanna, who farms 800 acres near Lima, has replaced more than one-fourth of his corn crop with soybeans, which require far less fertilizer. In part because of a global surge in demand, the price of fertilizer has skyrocketed 228 percent since 2000, forcing U.S. farmers to switch crops, cut back on fertilizer or search for manure as a substitute. Wholesalers and retailers are scrambling to find and buy fertilizer and juggle what supplies they...

The global financial system these days is beginning to look like a giant Whac-a-Mole game--when we think we've knocked down one speculative bubble, another one just like it pops up. The latest is the commodities bubble--everything from oil and natural gas to gold, copper, wheat and rice....Like the credit bubble, this speculative bubble in commodities has badly distorted the workings of key markets and sectors of the global economy....this bubble is creating vast new wealth for some, including brokers, traders and investment houses who have gorged on fees and trading profits. The difference this time, however, is that even before...

This is destined to be a grim Memorial Day weekend in the region, what with the price of a gallon of gasoline climbing to $4 a gallon and food costs surging beyond the financial means of consumers. In response to the assault on our wallets, many of us may be forced to scale back our barbecue menu to beans, bread and water. With unemployment moving toward Great Depression-like numbers, businesses being shuttered across the region and many homes in the foreclosure process, more Americans than ever are pessimistic about the future and think our best days are behind us. They...

Food stamp recipients pinched by high food prices By DON BABWIN, Associated Press Writer 9 minutes ago Danielle Brown stands outside a South Side market at midnight, braving the spring chill for her first chance to buy groceries since her food stamps ran out nearly two weeks ago. For days, Brown said, she has been turning cans of "whatever we got in the cabinet" into breakfast, lunch and dinner for her children, ages 1 and 3. "Ain't got no food left, the kids are probably hungry," said Brown, a 23-year-old single mother who relies heavily on her $312 monthly allotment...

Obese people are contributing to the world food crisis and climate change, experts say. The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine calculated the obese consume 18% more calories than average. They are also responsible for using more fuel, which has an environmental impact and drives up food prices as transport and agriculture both use oil. The result is that the poor struggle to afford food and greenhouse gas emissions rise, the Lancet reported. It comes as the World Health Organization predicts the obese population will double by 2015 to 700m. In the UK, nearly a quarter of adults are...

Restaurants are feeling the pinch in two directions. With money tight, consumers are cutting back on how often they dine out. Meantime, food costs more. Way more. Egg prices have doubled in the last six months. Dairy, chicken, beer and bread crumb prices are all climbing higher. Even when the core commodity escapes the trend, packaged ingredients and other restaurant supplies are more expensive as the costs of transportation climb due to higher fuel prices. When people do go out, they are ordering less. "Appetizer sales are down. Dessert sales can almost disappear," says Dan Simons, principal at Vucurevich Simons...

Agriculture: The subsidy-stuffed farm bill just passed by Congress is a monster that will leave us with less food at higher prices. The president should veto it right away and force this foolish Congress to override him.Congress may think it's doing the "people's work," as they like to say, but the pork-laden, market-distorting farm bill is anything but. In fact, it's an obscene waste of money that will leave us all poorer and hungrier for the effort. As of now, though, it looks like it will become law. The measure passed the House on Wednesday by a veto-proof margin of...

At a press conference today, leaders from farm and ethanol groups pointed to skyrocketing oil prices, hedge fund commodity speculators, growing worldwide demand for grain and severe droughts as the major factors underlying rising food prices. They also pointed to the expansion of biofuels as preventing even higher oil prices. The groups cited Merrill Lynch analyst Francisco Blanch’s estimate that oil and gasoline prices would be about 15% higher, or $4.14 a gallon at today’s prices, if biofuel producers weren't increasing their output.

MOGADISHU, Somalia -- Troops fired into tens of thousands of rioting Somalis on Monday, killing two people in the latest eruption of violence over soaring food prices around the world. Wielding thick sticks and hurling stones that smashed the windshields of several cars and buses, the rioters jammed the narrow streets of the Somali capital, screaming, "Down with those suffocating us!" In Mogadishu, protesters including women and children marched against the refusal of traders to accept old 1,000-shilling notes, blaming them and a growing number of counterfeiters for rising food costs. Within an hour, a reporter for The Associated Press...

McCain says he would veto farm bill Published: May 2, 2008 at 9:11 PM DES MOINES, Iowa, May 2 (UPI) -- Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., told an audience of Iowans that if he were president, he would veto a farm subsidy bill now making its way through Congress. "I do not support it. I would veto it," McCain told the audience of about 250 people in Des Moines Thursday. "I would do that because I believe that these subsidies, the subsidies are unnecessary." The Republican Party's presumptive presidential nominee later told The Des Moines Register in an interview, "At this...

When is the last time food managed to become a campaign issue? The answer is four years ago, when Republicans and conservatives made much of the fact that the “elitist, effete” John Kerry ordered a Philly cheese steak sandwich topped with Swiss rather than Cheez Whiz. Campaign coverage has become more and more substance-free over the years, with this year’s obsession over ministers and Hillary Clinton’s experience with firearms ranking as the absolutely silliest display, probably ever. There was a day when American journalism had no standards, but even those – by comparison – were sobering, serious discussions of policy....

David Kotok, chairman and chief investment officer of Cumberland Advisors, said the deadly fungus, Puccinia graminis, is now spreading through some areas of the globe where "crop losses are expected to reach 100 percent.” Losses in Africa are already at 70 percent of the crop, Kotok said. "The economic losses expected from this fungus are now in the many billions and growing. Worse, there is an intensifying fear of exacerbated food shortages in poor and emerging countries of the world,” Kotok told investors in a research note. "The ramifications are serious. Food rioting continues to expand around the world. We...

I don't want to alarm anybody, but maybe it's time for Americans to start stockpiling food. No, this is not a drill. You've seen the TV footage of food riots in parts of the developing world. Yes, they're a long way away from the U.S. But most foodstuffs operate in a global market. When the cost of wheat soars in Asia, it will do the same here. Reality: Food prices are already rising here much faster than the returns you are likely to get from keeping your money in a bank or money-market fund. And there are very good reasons...

With the world consuming more food than it produces and global grain stocks the lowest for 30 years, food prices are soaring from Indonesia to Indianapolis. Some experts called it the Perfect Storm and others a tsunami. The global food crisis has a common denominator with the still unfolding subprime mortgage debacle whose losses the International Monetary Fund (IMF) now estimates at $1.1 trillion: Greed. Predatory lending coupled with criminal profiteering was behind the still unfolding subprime mortgage debacle whose losses the International Monetary Fund now estimates at $1.1 trillion. It is the largest loss of wealth in modern U.S....

SAN FRANCISCO (KCBS) -- Since January, the price of rice has jumped more than 100 percent around the world, and this means Bay Area stores are now changing policies for their customers. A 20 pound bag of basmati rice at Costco sold for $8.99 just two months ago. Today it’s nearly doubled at $15.99. A spokesman for Costco Mountain View says some customers are hoarding rice by buying a membership, and then trying to buy 30 or 40 bags of the grain. This has lead store officials to put limits on the amount of rice one person can buy, based...

Josh Gerstein, a reporter for The New York Sun, has taken scare journalism to a new low. He reports that food rationing is now occurring in the United States. It happens insidiously as we sleep. He even accuses us of hoarding food when we shop at Costco. Gerstein samples the panic and desperation that stampedes voraciously through the panic-stricken masses of Mountain View, California. At a Costco Warehouse in Mountain View, Calif., yesterday, shoppers grew frustrated and occasionally uttered expletives as they searched in vain for the large sacks of rice they usually buy."Where's the rice?" an engineer from Palo...

To paraphrase the late, great William F. Buckley, Jr., someone must stand athwart the federal ethanol program yelling, “Stop!” The emergency brake should be pulled -- NOW -- before ethanol wreaks further havoc. Poor Haitians rioted last week outside Port-au-Prince’s presidential palace, forcing Prime Minister Jacques Edouard Alexis’ April 12 ouster. Haitians are enduring food prices 40 percent higher than last summer’s. Some have resorted to eating cookies made of salt, vegetable oil, and dirt. That’s right: Dirt cookies. Developing-world denizens are taking it to the streets with growling stomachs. In Bob Marley’s words, “A hungry man is an angry...

Energy: The world's poor are learning what happens when government subsidizes the burning of food. It's time to end this madness and let the market decide if any biofuels make sense. For most Americans, the rising prices at the supermarket are definitely an annoyance, but hardly a threat to life and health. It's a different story in countries like Haiti, where food inflation has led to real hunger and, last week, to riots. News reports say the poorest Haitians are trying to get by on cookies made with dirt, vegetable oil and salt. Food riots also have roiled Egypt and...

<p>The idea of the starving masses driven by their desperation to take to the streets and overthrow the ancien regime has seemed impossibly quaint since capitalism triumphed so decisively in the Cold War. Since then, the spectacle of hunger sparking revolutionary violence has been the stuff of Broadway musicals rather than the real world of politics. And yet, the headlines of the past month suggest that skyrocketing food prices are threatening the stability of a growing number of governments around the world. Ironically, it may be the very success of capitalism in transforming regions previously restrained by various forms of socialism that has helped create the new crisis.</p>

U.S. Food Inflation Worst in 17 Years Associated Press NEW YORK -- Steve Tarpin can bake a graham cracker crust in his sleep, but explaining why the price for his Key lime pies went from $20 to $25 required mastering a thornier topic: global economics. He recently wrote a letter to his customers and posted it near the cash register listing the factors -- dairy prices driven higher by conglomerates buying up milk supplies, heat waves in Europe and California, demand from emerging markets and the weak dollar. The owner of Steve's Authentic Key Lime Pies in Brooklyn said he...

Dubai: The food price and supply situation is turning worse, and in some places is uglier than expected and could lead to domestic turmoil, including the "risk of war", a top official said. The food price situation has already claimed its first victim - the Haitian Prime Minister Jacques Edouard Alexis - who was forced to quit, and food ration lines in Bangladesh are becoming longer everyday with sporadic incidents, reflecting a near explosive situation due to hunger. "Food prices, if they go on like they are doing today... the consequences will be terrible," International Monetary Fund (IMF) managing director...

As if a housing crisis, rising energy costs and a soft labor market weren't enough to cause economic anxiety for the average American, now consumers are feeling the pinch of rapidly escalating food costs. The United States has long prided itself in being the breadbasket of the world, and Americans have traditionally paid a smaller share of their income on food than citizens of other developed countries. But the days of cheap milk, bread, beef and poultry may well be over — and Uncle Sam is partly to blame. In 2007, the cost of a gallon of milk increased 26...

Pizza makers must weigh rising costs of wheat with competition 2 days ago DETROIT - First, it was cheese. And many pizza makers across America absorbed sharply rising prices of the staple ingredient as long as they could before passing along some of the expense. Now, they're dealing with the surging price of wheat used to make pizza crust. Players big, small and in between in the US$30 billion-plus industry are feeling the heat as they figure out how to deal with the double-barrel price spikes of the gooey and grainy commodities without sacrificing their quality, competitive edge or customer...

WASHINGTON - The U.S. government's humanitarian relief agency will significantly scale back emergency food aid to some of the world's poorest countries this year because of soaring global food prices, and the U.S. Agency for International Development is drafting plans to reduce the number of recipient nations, the amount of food provided to them, or both, officials at the agency said. USAID officials said that a 41 percent surge in prices for wheat, corn, rice and other cereals over the past six months has generated a $120 million budget shortfall that will force the agency to reduce emergency operations. That...

BEIJING - Food prices are set to rise around the globe after years of decline, with climate change making it harder for the world's poorest to get adequate food, according to a report released Tuesday. Rising global temperatures as well as growing food consumption in rapidly developing countries such as China and India are pressuring the world food system, meaning that food prices will rise for the foreseeable future, according to the International Food Policy Research Institute. Joachim von Braun, the director of the Washington-based research group, said food prices have been in a declining trend since scientists began developing...

Drawing down our national stockpiles of agricultural crops in order to turn them into ethanol is stupid. This is just the sort of policy idea we have grown accustomed to hearing from people who own four SUVs yet still cringe at the thought of other people’s industrial activities causing higher than normal gas prices. It’s the sort of pathetic panderation that shouldn’t be issued for consumption except when rich, urban presidential candidates are trying to convince the yeoman caucus-farmers of Iowa to bless off on their pathetic candidacies. Despite all that I said above being undeniably true, ethanol plays a...

ROME — Biofuels like ethanol can help reduce global warming and create jobs for the rural poor, but the benefits may be offset by serious environmental problems and increased food prices for the hungry, the United Nations concluded Tuesday in its first major report on bioenergy. In an agency-wide assessment, the United Nations raised alarms about the potential negative impact of biofuels, just days after a climate conference in Bangkok said the world had both the money and technology to prevent the sharp rise in global temperatures blamed in part on greenhouse gas emissions. Biofuels, which are made from corn,...

WASHINGTON -- A new Rand Corp. study showing the falling costs of ethanol, wind power and other forms of renewable energy predicts such sources could furnish as much as 25% of the U.S.'s conventional energy by 2025 at little or no additional expense. A second renewable-energy report soon to be released by the National Academy of Sciences suggests wood chips may become a plentiful source of ethanol and electricity for industrial nations because their forested areas are expanding, led by the U.S. and China. Because use of renewable fuels to replace oil and cut emissions of carbon dioxide is an...

Juan Alba had been feeling the squeeze from soaring tomato prices for nearly three months. Something had to give. "We had new menus printed and just started using them today," Alba, the owner of El Campesino restaurants in Ross and Monroeville, said Friday. New prices will help cover Alba's weekly produce bills, which have swelled by $200. Blame that on tomatoes. With planting delayed in Florida because of hurricanes and heavy rains drenching hundreds of acres of crops in California, the juicy red fruit that is the staple of salsa and sauce suddenly is in short supply. The result: A...

Shortage Expected to Cause Prices to Skyrocket Worth their weight in gold? At least one local restaurant has already changed its pricing because of high beef prices, and grocery store prices are anticipated to jump soon. “An astronomical increase,” is the way Ted Mackorell of Makoto Seafood and Steak House described the jump in beef prices this week. “It has been inching up on us for the last month,” Mackorell said, “but both of our purveyors came in this morning and said, ‘Brace yourself.’” Over the past month and a half, Mackorell explained, his beef prices have increased by about...

For education and discussion only. Not for commercial use. WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Brutal drought in the American Grain Belt, part of a downturn in crops worldwide, will bring the smallest U.S. corn and soybean harvest since the mid-1990s, the government said on Monday, whipping a price stampede that could run far into next year. U.S. crops might shrivel more without relief from a drought that gripped one-third of the nation. The Agriculture Department reported crop losses on every continent, ending a remarkable five-year run of large crops globally. Smaller crops would have no immediate effect on U.S. consumer food prices,...