Recent spikes in staple food prices resulting from the invasion of Ukraine have once again highlighted the difficulty faced by low-income countries that rely on imports for a substantial portion of their
Unwilling to commit to a definite view on the fate of forward trading in essential commodities, food minister Sharad Pawar told the Rajya Sabha that "there are a lot of conflicting views'. Mr Pawar's vacillation comes in the wake of indication that the Abhijit Sen Committee is likely to take a safe view that a given available data, there appears to be no corelation between futures trading and increase in essential commodity prices.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who belives that the food crisis had reached emergency proportions, is considering to convene a world summit to discuss how to respond to the crisis, his spokesperson said Thursday. "Yes, that is exactly what he is considering," spokesperson Michele Montas said when asked whether the UN chief plans to hold a gathering of world leaders to find ways to respond to the grave problems of food availability and high prices that have led to protests and tensions in many countries.
AGRICULTURE, food and civil supplies minister Sharad Pawar on Wednesday frustrated attempts by the Congress Left-combine to put the blame for the current bout of inflation on opposition-ruled states.
The EU's top trade official said on Thursday that rising world prices for food must be tackled with trade deals that encourage developing nations, particularly in Africa, to boost food output. E.U. Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson said the world's agricultural producers should shy away from export restrictions or bans that would not help deal with "a longer term structural trend ... as population grows, as demand for food grows.' He was speaking to the European Parliament's trade committee. Trade deal
The Left parties on Thursday were dissatisfied with the government's proposed measures to control inflation, saying prices of foodgrains and edible oil were still on the higher side and the burden on the common man had not eased. Communist Party of India (Marxist) leader Sitaram Yechury told reporters that the concerns of the Left parties had not been addressed by Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar in his reply in Parliament to the discussion on rising prices.
The UPA government on Thursday tried to partly deflect criticism for rising food prices towards the Opposition as well as on factors outside its control. Failure of foodgrain procurement by NDA-governed states and international food crisis, it claimed in Rajya Sabha, were to blame for the prices even as Left joined the Opposition in staging a walkout.
Over 2,000 cadre removed when they tried to stage demonstrations UP IN ARMS: (left) The activists of the Communist Party of India being prevented from staging a dharna on Huzur Road in the city on Thursday deploring the Central Government for failure to control inflation and price rise. (right) Similar demonstration held in Tirupur.
The government on Thursday rejected the Left parties' plea to restore the universal public distribution system (PDS) and was lukewarm to their second major demand for scrapping futures trading in agricultural commodities. Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar's reply in the Rajya Sabha to a short duration discussion on the "unprecedented price rise of commodities' left the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the Left parties and the United National Progressive Alliance dissatisfied leading to separate walkouts.
Lindsay Renwick, the mayor of this dusty southern Australian town, remembers the constant whir of the rice mill. "It was our little heartbeat out there, ticketytick-tickety," he said, imitating the giant fans that dried the rice, "and now it has stopped." The Deniliquin mill, the largest rice mill in the Southern Hemisphere, once processed enough grain to meet the needs of 20 million people around the world. But six long years of drought have taken a toll, reducing Australia's rice crop by 98 per cent and leading to the mothballing of the mill last December.
Giving UPA some relief, the wholesale price index-based inflation rate on Thursday inched down to 7.14% from last week's fouryear peak of 7.41% after the government last week took several fiscal steps to rein in rising food prices.
