Further crisis's of capitalism, food prices to double by 2030

The price of key crops could rise by up to 180%, Oxfam says Continue reading the Food prices 'threaten millions'
More food market regulation urged
The prices of staple foods will more than double in 20 years unless world leaders take action to reform the global food system, Oxfam has warned.

By 2030, the average cost of key crops will increase by between 120% and 180%, the charity forecasts.

Half of that increase will be caused by climate change, Oxfam predicts, in its report Growing a Better Future.

It calls on world leaders to improve regulation of food markets and invest in a global climate fund.

"The food system must be overhauled if we are to overcome the increasingly pressing challenges of climate change, spiralling food prices and the scarcity of land, water and energy," said Barbara Stocking, Oxfam's chief executive.

Women and children

In its report, Oxfam highlights four "food insecurity hotspots", areas which are already struggling to feed their citizens.

We are sleepwalking towards an avoidable age of crisis - one in seven people go hungry every day despite the fact that the world is capable of feeding everyone”


Oxfam chief executive
in Guatemala, 865,000 people are at risk of food insecurity, due to a lack of state investment in smallholder farmers, who are highly dependent on imported food, the charity says.
in India, people spend more than twice the proportion of their income on food than UK residents - paying the equivalent of £10 for a litre of milk and £6 for a kilo of rice.
in Azerbaijan, wheat production fell 33% last year due to poor weather, forcing the country to import grains from Russia and Kazakhstan. Food prices were 20% higher in December 2010 than the same month in 2009.
in East Africa, eight million people currently face chronic food shortages due to drought, with women and children among the hardest hit.
The World Bank has also warned that rising food prices are pushing millions of people into extreme poverty.

In April, it said food prices were 36% above levels of a year ago, driven by problems in the Middle East and North Africa.

Oxfam wants nations to agree new rules to govern food markets, to ensure the poor do not go hungry.

It said world leaders must:

increase transparency in commodities markets and regulate futures markets
scale up food reserves
end policies promoting biofuels
invest in smallholder farmers, especially women
"We are sleepwalking towards an avoidable age of crisis," said Ms Stocking.

"One in seven people on the planet go hungry every day despite the fact that the world is capable of feeding everyone."

Among the many factors driving rising food prices in the coming decades, Oxfam predicts that climate change will have the most serious impact.

Ahead of the UN climate summit in South Africa in December, it calls on world leaders to launch a global climate fund, "so that people can protect themselves from the impacts of climate change and are better equipped to grow the food they need".


From the BBC.

But what this article does not mention that it is the corrupt rotten system of capitalism that has led us to this position. The hunger for profit has come before the hunger for feeding the world. The fact that climate change has occured can be directly attibuted to capitalism and its exploitation of the earth. The only reason there will be further food shortages in the future will be down to this unfair system and only a over throw of this system to a fairer socialist society will be able to benifit the many not just the few.

In rich countries such as America and the United Kingdom so much food is wasted yet so much of the world goes hungry, How can this be ?

Mass over production of food in the west is not expropriated around the world. There is no collaboration to help poorer nations feed their population and that i'm afraid is a disgrace that we continue to allow to happen in 2011.