Posted on 04/13/2008 3:43:57 PM PDT by bjs1779
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 Dominque Strauss-Kahn at a press conference ahead of the IMF-World Bank Spring Meetings in Washington.
Possible impact
Gulf News has been highlighting the global food price crisis and its possible impact on the Gulf countries. "Hundreds of thousands of people will be starving... [eading] to disruption of the economic environment," Strauss-Kahn told a news conference.
Development gains made in the past five or 10 years could be "totally destroyed," he said, warning that social unrest could even lead to war.
"As we know, learning from the past, those kind of questions sometimes end in war," he said. If the world wanted to avoid "these terrible consequences," then rising prices had to be tackled.
Skyrocketing prices on rice, wheat, corn and other staple foods like milk particularly hurt developing nations, where the bulk of income is spent on the bare necessities for survival.
Rising food prices have also encouraged the UAE government to intervene, when the Ministry of Economy allowed the retail chains to directly import food items by cutting the middlemen to keep prices of essentials at a decent level.
As a result, Union Cooperative Society and Emke Group have already signed a deal with the UAE Ministry of Economy to supply essential food items at 2007 base prices to help the consumers.
Oh goody! Then we can refer to them as “GORE WARS!”
Of course not. We’re only at “domestic turmoil” level so far. ;)
Rising food prices have also encouraged the UAE government to intervene, when the Ministry of Economy allowed the retail chains to directly import food items by cutting the middlemen to keep prices of essentials at a decent level.
As a result, Union Cooperative Society and Emke Group have already signed a deal with the UAE Ministry of Economy to supply essential food items at 2007 base prices to help the consumers.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
What the heck?!
Surely the citizens of the UAE are not poverty stricken and going hungry?
“And no one’s gettin’ fat ‘cept Mama Cass.....”
When? Where?
“Cry me a river. Pay up, world, or cut oil prices back to $30 a barrel. If you’d rather, you can pay $100 a bushel for any kind of grain. Yes that’s what I said, $100 a bushel, not $3, not $10. Why should oil be the only cartel on earth? “
BRAVO!!!
The Bush legacy gets another notch on the ol’ belt.
Hear Hear! Lets see the world run without American grain.
As usual, your comment is off base. Most of the people in the affected countries have nothing to do with oil.
A couple of them are already here. : )
"From the Space Weather Prediction Center
Updated 2008 Apr 13 2203 UTC
Joint USAF/NOAA Report of Solar and Geophysical Activity SDF Number 104 Issued at 2200Z on 13 Apr 2008
Analysis of Solar Active Regions and Activity from 12/2100Z to 13/2100Z: Solar activity was very low.... Solar activity remains low and things should remain quiet. The solar flux remains in the 60's[EA].
Solar Flux Definition
The 10.7 cm (2800 MHz) radio flux is the amount of solar noise (light) that is emitted by the sun at 10.7 cm wavelengths....
The solar flux is used as a basic indicator of solar activity. It can vary from values below 50 to values in excess of 300 (representing very low solar activity and high to very high solar activity respectively). Values in excess of 200 occur typical during the peak of the solar cycles.
Solar Activity Forecast: Solar activity is expected to be very low.
Source: http://www.solarcycle24.com.
In the next 5 years or so when the global warming scare is finally understood by all to be the hoax it is; will Al Gore be brought up on some kind of charges for fomenting the deaths of millions?
You better watch your mouth, we are exporting it with no regards to your well being.
Right on.
The one thing that could make the situation worse is a government-mandated price freeze - then you will REALLY see people starve. Unfortunately, it is the first solution that the bureaucrats always think of.
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