Prices of key food crops will fall significantly if the global community imposes a ban on crop-based production of biofuel, one of the key factors of recent food price increase, says a Washington-based research group. The price of maize will drop by 20 per cent, cassava by 14 per cent, sugar by 11 per cent and wheat by 11 per cent by 2010 in case of such moratoriums. The increased demand for biofuel between 2000 and 2007 contributed to 30 per cent increase in the overall grain prices, the International Food Policy Research Institute observed in its latest publication, Biofuels and Grain Prices: Impacts and Policy Responses. It said recent dramatic increases in food prices were having severe consequences for poor countries and poor people. In countries such as the United States and Brazil, biofuel policies led to large volumes of food crops being shifted into bioethanol and biodiesel production, triggering high food-price globally. The biggest impact of biofuel production is said to have been on maize prices