Newspaper editors consider the rightmost column (usually the sixth column, counting from the left) on the front page to be the position of prominence - its where they place the most important news of the day, as they interpret it. Last Friday's Financial Times column six headline was "Nestle chief fears long-term food price inflation".
I've been tagging some items here about food price inflation over the last few months - the "corn riots" in Mexico and other weak signals. The impact of biofuels on corn prices has been pretty clear, and painful in places like Mexico where it was hurt the poor especially. However, most economists believe that higher prices will boost farmers' incentives to produce more, evening things out.
But chairman Peter Brabeck of Nestle pointed to another trend in his forecast, talking to the FT while travelling in Asia - rising demand from China and India would have "a long-lasting impact on food prices". To quote the FT: "Several food companies have warned about the short-term outlook for prices, but Mr. Brabeck's comments are among the starkest warnings that a long period of rising food prices could stoke broader inflationary pressures."
This news comes at a time that we're increasingly aware of the massive global transformation of food. I've already blogged about the increasing volatility in China's pork market, and the global economic and environmental consequences. Also, absolutely not to be missed is Time's excellent special issue on food last week: aptly titled We Are What We Eat, it chronicles the massive transformation of global eating habits across the globalizing world.
Link: "Nestle chief fears long-term food price inflation", Financial Times Fri July 6 2007
Comments