The global crisis in food
Submitted by Robert Daeley on Fri, 2008-06-06 08:03.
BBC: Tortilla prices put pressure on poor
Tortillas are what these people live on, so they are much more than just bread. And when the price of tortillas rises, it is big news.
That is why a recent announcement by Mexico’s National Chamber for the Tortilla and Dough Industry made such an impact.
The chamber predicted that tortilla prices would rise by about 18% in the next month because of rising costs of fuel and corn.[…]
In simple terms, that would mean the price of a kilogram of tortillas would go up from about 8.5 pesos (80 US cents) a kilo now to around 10 pesos a kilo in June.
If you live on $5 a day, that kind of increase is a big deal - and the government knows it.[…]
National Geographic: Israel’s Ethiopians Forced to Give Up Traditional Bread
The crisis that has sent food costs spiraling upward around the globe is causing Ethiopian Jews now living in Israel to give up something priceless: a piece of their culture.
Tens of thousands of the expatriates are being forced to abandon their traditional diets because of the skyrocketing cost of teff grain.
Teff, a nutritious and hardy cereal domesticated in Ethiopia thousands of years ago, is the primary ingredient in injera, a round flatbread that accompanies most Ethiopian meals.
A drastic shortage has caused the price of teff to jump by some 300 percent over the past year.
Both the BBC and National Geographic, as well as other outlets, have reports and on-going series on the looming problem: