The world price of staple foods has rocketed, almost doubling in the past 18
months. For consumers in the rich world this massive increase in the price
of wheat or rice is an inconvenience; for consumers in the poorest countries
it is a catastrophe.
Food accounts for around half of the entire budget of most Africans. Of course
some poor households sell food, but many are net buyers. Indeed, decades of
agricultural stagnation and growing populations have turned many African
countries into food importers. The households that are poor and net
purchasers of food are concentrated in the urban slums. These slums are
already political powder kegs: rising food prices have triggered riots from
Ivory Coast to Indonesia, from Burkina Faso to Bangladesh. Indeed they sow
the seeds of an ugly and destructive populist politics.
Why have food prices rocketed? Paradoxically, this squeeze on the poorest has
come about as a result of the success of globalisation in reducing world
poverty. As China develops, helped by its massive exports to our markets,
millions of Chinese households have started to eat better. Better means not
just more food but more meat, the new luxury. But to produce 1kg of meat
takes 6kg of grain. Livestock reared for meat to be consumed in Asia are now
eating the grain that would previously have been eaten by the African poor.
So what is the remedy?
The best solution to a problem is often not to reverse what caused the
problem. If you broke your leg by falling off a cliff, it is not a good idea
to climb back up. The best solution to the rise in food prices is not to
arrest globalisation. China's long march to prosperity is something to
celebrate. The remedy to high food prices is to increase supply. The most
realistic way is to replicate the Brazilian model of large, technologically
sophisticated agro-companies that supply the world market. There are still
many areas of the world - including large swaths of Africa - that have good
land that could be used far more productively if it were properly managed by
large companies. To contain the rise in food prices we need more,
globalisation not less.
Unfortunately, large-scale commercial agriculture is deeply, perhaps
irredeemably, unromantic. We laud the production style of the peasant:
environmentally sustainable and human in scale. In respect of manufacturing
we grew out of this fantasy years ago, but in agriculture it continues to
contaminate our policies. In Europe and Japan huge public resources have
been devoted to propping up small farms. The best that can be said for these
policies is that we can afford them.
In Africa, which cannot afford such policies, the World Bank and the
Department for International Development have orientated their entire
efforts on agricultural development to peasant-style production. Africa has
less large-scale commercial agriculture than it had 60 years ago.
Unfortunately, peasant farming is not well suited to innovation and
investment. The result has been that African agriculture has fallen farther
and farther behind.
Our longstanding agricultural romanticism has been compounded by our newfound
environmental romanticism. In the United States fear of climate change has
been manipulated by shrewd interests to produce grotesquely inefficient
subsidies to biofuel. Around a third of American grain production has
rapidly been diverted into energy production. This demonstrates both the
superb responsiveness of the markets to price signals, and the shameful
power of subsidy-hunting lobby groups. However, just as livestock are eating
the food that would have been consumed by poor Africans, so Americans are
running their SUVs on it. One SUV tank of biofuel uses enough grain to feed
an African family for a year.
In Europe deep-seated fears of science have been manipulated into a ban on
both the production and import of genetically modified crops. This has
obviously retarded productivity growth in European agriculture. Again the
best that can be said of it is that we are rich enough to afford such folly.
But as an unintended side-effect it has terrified African governments into
banning GM lest their farmers be shut out of European markets. Africa
definitely cannot afford this self-denial. It needs all the help it can
possibly get from GM drought-resistant crops.
While the policies needed for the long term have been befuddled by
romanticism, the short-term global response has been pure
beggar-thy-neighbour. It is easier for urban slum dwellers to riot than for
farmers: riots need streets, not fields. And so, in the internal tussles
between poor consumers and poor producers, the interests of consumers have
prevailed in the developing countries.
Governments in grain-exporting countries, such as Argentina, have swung prices
in favour of their consumers and against their farmers by banning or
restricting exports. But such tariffs and export bans make investing in
commercial-scale food production less attractive, drive up prices further
still in the food-importing countries, and discourage farmers from
increasing their yields, exacerbating global food shortages.
Unfortunately, trade in agricultural produce has been the main economic
activity to have resisted the force of globalisation. The cost of this is
now being picked up by the poorest people in the world.
Paul Collier is Professor of Economics at Oxford University and the author of
The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries are Failing and What can be
Done about It
The number of bushels per acre is not determined by the scale of the individual farm. It is the soil, weather, water, seeds, fertilizer, crop rotation, and expertise. Whether a small, family farm, or large, corporation farm, the yield can be comparable. Factory farms are not more efficient.
Mike D., Sioux City, IA , USA
"Why have food prices rocketed? Paradoxically, this squeeze on the poorest has come about as a result of the success of globalisation in reducing world poverty." Can you get any more stupidly contradictory than that statement? This is the psuedo-science world of economics for you.
Marsha, St.Paul, MN
Mr Collier ignores the politics of food production and distribution. Here lies the pit that undoes his argument : "But as an unintended side-effect it has terrified African governments into banning GM lest their farmers be shut out of European markets. Africa definitely cannot afford this self-denial. It needs all the help it can possibly get from GM drought-resistant crops." Why are African countries that can barely feed their own people exporting food? The same can be said of India, which is a major exporter of grain, yet vast numbers of its people are subsistence farmers.
While the land is sequestered from the people by wealthy cliques (who our governments generously support) the science of food production is meaningless. We will have to deal with this in the future as some 30 million people will flee starvation in north Africa and seek to come to Europe. That's a problem that will be solved by plitics, not food science.
clive, surrey,
The fundamental problem is the continual increases in world population. Food shortages, climate problems etc are all secondary and they are derivatives of the world population going out of control. China is the only subcontinent that has made significant progress on the population problem.
B S Goh, Sydney, Australia
Well well, another professor of economics who feels qualified to comment on the problems of climate change and agricultural development. It must be nice to live in a world where topsoil is an undepletable resource, fossil fuels are as abundant and harmless as water, and global climate change is nothing more than a clever scare tactic employed by industry lobbyists.
However, that is nothing more than a romantic fantasy predicated upon the unrealistic assumptions of neoclassical economics. Sometimes, the best solution to a problem IS to reverse it's cause, irrelevant metaphors aside. The root cause of the nascent crisis of industrial agriculture is not that there's not enough of it - it is that industrial agriculture is an unsustainable system that cannot be MADE sustainable by building more factory farms.
For the opinions/ solutions generated by experts in more relevant fields, please visit www.agassessment.org
Elias, Medford, MA
I would have thought better of Paul Collier, no mention an extra one and a half million mouths to feed in the world every week! If there is a case for not growing biofuels, there is an equal case for not growing flowers, or tobacco. We could plough up all golf courses and football pitches. Those who knock the USA should realise that by far the greatest amount of the worlds' surplus of grains is grown there, Australia by comparison is a minor player, [ indeed in 2003 Australia was a net importer of wheat! and in a good year grows less than the UK.]
Africa has a very unstable climate, and almost all North African countries are great food importers. There is a lot worse to come yet, giving extra cash aid to the desparate will not grow another tonne of wheat! And now we are told Rice is very short, and rice needs lots of water.
David Vinter, Louth, Lincs., UK.
With people like Mugabe around what maniac would invest in a large scale commercial farm in Africa? The only people likely to do it have learned their lesson.
James Ball, WATERFORD, VA USA
Professor Collier has failed to realize that the real problem is over population of the planet earth. Demand drives prices because of the ever increasing number of mouths to feed and the destruction of habitat and species to grow the food.
If a professor cannot grasp the real cause of the problem, then it is of no surprise that the solutions to the survival of the planet are not being implemented.
Professor Colliers speciality is economics. His scholastic discipline is all about money and the teaching of money making theories and not about environmental science and population control systems.
The resources necessary to feed and house the masses of popúlation is diminishing rapidly. We are polluting our planetas rivers and oceans, flooding the atmosphere with carbon dioxide and nitrigenous oxide and deminishing our oxygen supply. Professor Collier does not relate his subject to these matters when justiying his opinions.
Jim Wills, Buenos Aires, Argentina
I would have thought better of Paul Collier, no mention an extra one and a half million mouths to feed in the world every week! If there is a case for not growing biofuels, there is an equal case for not growing flowers, or tobacco. We could plough up all golf courses and football pitches. Those who knock the USA should realise that by far the greatest amount of the worlds' surplus of grains is grown there, Australia by comparison is a minor player, [ indeed in 2003 Australia was a net importer of wheat! and in a good year grows less than the UK.]
Africa has a very unstable climate, and almost all North African countries are great food importers. There is a lot worse to come yet, giving extra cash aid to the desparate will not grow another tonne of wheat! And now we are told Rice is very short, and rice needs lots of water.
David Vinter, Louth, Lincs., UK.
With due respect to your learned analysis, you have omitted the crucial factor, population. One can solve the food problem given a specific population, but the food problem is insoluble in an increasing level of population. Population is therefore the primary factor. It is an instructive point that all these rigorous endeavours with regard to food are necessary because we cannot do anything about population. More to the point we can t even discuss it or discuss the possibilities that surround the delicate point of stabilisation or otherwise. It is the politics of the West that is the problem here, and at the present time it looks more likely that disaster, not planning, will equilibrate population with food production.
Henry Percy, London, UK
The world's population is out of hand. This is just inevitable. The human race is destroying everything in its path through greedy, selfish consumption and sits back looking for someone to blame.
Kv, London,
Is "Globalization" a New-New Religion ?
Dan Berlinski, Geneva, Switzerland
On and on goes the great panjandrum.
In 1968 United Arab republic pop was 28 million
Egypt alone now has 65 million. All dependent on one river-the Nile, and a 12 mile strip of fertile land. This is only possible because Britain created a treaty precluding East African states from using those waters in way that effected Egypt detrimentally. if East Africa faced with higher population and aspirations were to divert those waters it would be catastrophic for Egypt. The same strictures apply to most of Africa, and large swathes of the planet.
ged, manchester,
". . this squeeze on the poorest has come about as a result of the success of globalisation . ."
Precisely - it's globalisation that got us into this mess in the first place - to argue that we therefore need more of it is utterly perverse.
Economists begin their training by being told that everything's fine if we had "perfect markets", but for many reasons these are impossible. Then they bury their heads in the sand and devise a whole disciplinary structure as if it were not so.
Inadequacies of communications leave the world's poor incommunicado, while money market parasites get million pound bonuses.
And structural immobilities of 'LAND' and 'LABOUR' mean the latter always loses out, while 'CAPITAL' is misused to exploit it and get round the former - also robbing the 3rd world of its resources.
Prof. Collier I know not where you learnt your subject or did your research, but somewhere along the way you got nailed into its conventional box, and now cannot think outside it.
D. Milligan, Great Yarmouth, UK
Why is fuel the only problem? Isn't there a problem with using agricultural land for coffee, tea, sugar, timber, cotton, tobacco, and the kind of alcohol people drink? How do we justify grapes for wine? Or owning 20 cotton shirts?
Biofuels are just new, and not so different from anything else that is grown in place of basic foods.
M.C., Washington DC, USA
why focus on China only? what about the developed countries like U.S., France, U.S., they have been eating meats for so many years and would consume how much grain?
Amy , Shenzhen , China
This man despite his creditials is off the mark. The principals of permaculture being implemented at the local level would do a much better job relieving this crisis than supporting the monoculture of agro-business which created this problem.
Evan Schoepke, Olympia,
Prof Collier talks absolute rubbish with respect to GM crops. Where are these wonderful drought-resistant GM crops he refers to? There aren't any. Virtually all of the GM crops that have been commercialised are herbicide-tolerant or engineered to be toxic to insects -- they are designed to enhance sales of seeds and agricultural chemicals. They were never designed to increase yields or to improve productivity in stressed situations. And how is an extension of corporate feudalism (with small farmers tied in to seed and chemical purchase contracts with the likes of Monsanto) supposed to do anything at all to alleviate poverty or hunger? That may make economic sense to the shareholders of Monsanto, but it will be an unmitigated disaster from a social, poliotical and environmental point of view. Time for some joined-up thinking, please, dear Professor!
Brian John, Newport, Wales
The urban romantic sitting in a cupboard sized flat in London yearns for that place in the country where they will find ultimate peace of mind. There are plenty of would be yeoman farmers who sell up to buy a one-way ticket into their dreams. Unfortunately the blunt reality soon sets in after the first year, when their initial capital has been largely spent, and they discover there are absolutely no jobs that match their qualifications. If you are unable to take your city work with you then you need to resort to local employment. In the country this is entirely minimum wage. No more leaning on your crook gazing over the farm gate for you. It is more likely to be a shift in the meat renderers, metal bending in a freezing shed, or burger flipping in a takeaway. That's it I'm afraid. Sorry to put the dampers on everything, but isolation, no money and zero opportunity in the UK countryside is a stark reality. I should stay in London if I were you.
Colin, Carmarthen, UK
I read an article about the World Toilet convention. Toilets are being made that trap the gas which is then used for lighting, heating andas fuel for cooking. Why are we using bio-fuels when each of us in producing our own fuel? In many countries sewage goes straight into water supplies. 80% of the world's diseases are caused by dirty water. The residue from these toilets makes good fertilizer, so cutting out the need for chemicals and GMO's. This technology sounds like the ideal solution to me.
Joy Brodier, Reims, France
Big companies are probably a good solution to the problem for innovation and renewal of some agricultural technics. But history has learned that big companies are allways looking for better salesprices and are constantly reducing manpower. This will, long term, make big companies to goven opver certain products and increase prices, where we will foind ourselves back to square 1.
De graeve, Gent, Belgium
Consolidation and squeezing happens in every sector and maybe it's something farmers need to look at. They seem to think they have a god-given right to farm and receive handouts. What about the car manufacturers and coal miners? In this rapidly changing world it's time to adapt and ditch the poor me syndrome!
Ks, London,
Totally baffling. What did Africans live on .BEFORE colonisation? Why are they eating Rice?
The consequence of industrialisation and scientific advance has been increasing populations because unlike Europeans who have matched their brith rates to decreasing child mortality and increasing prosperity so in Europe Births barely match deaths.ie 1-1.8 instead of 2.2. Most poor countries where 10 births led to 8 deaths there are still 10 births and considerably less mortality. Solving that problem is the priority.
ged, manchester,
Just when the world was beginning to get its collective head around caring for the environment that remains, we will now be panicked into introducing GM technology and re-introducing intensive, large-scale farming practices. If I thought these measures would feed the starving I would approve. But they will not. They will just put money into the big companies pockets. The point about having to buy GM seed every year is valid, and just the tip of the (melting) iceberg. Please don't be hoodwinked into losing the little progress we have made.
Janet, Cumbria,
I have to agree with Paul of York. There are several impending EU directives which will seriously harm agricultural production in this country.
It is not impossible to forsee a time where we may stop complaining about the price of food and would just be grateful if we had some.
Norman, Cheshire,
Does Planet Earth have the resources to enable an ever expanding human population to live at the standard of living of Europe or America? Are the resources there? In food, fossil fuels, raw materials (including renewables) we are consuming ever more & more - and trashing the environment on which we depend. Anyone who thinks this can go on for ever is living in a fool's paradise.
Dave, Wrexham,
Just look what the Green hysteria has done! Raised taxes and then starve the world! Great! Of course, they will be the only ones left at the end. Rapidly loosing my tolerance for these middle class do gooders!
Henry, Oxford, UK
The only way to stop starvation is to stop the increase of people. The more food, the more people. If we behave like animals, we will die like animals ... either from starvation or predators. We can behave like civilized humans and control our population ... only then will be be able to live a civilized life
J. W. Fenwick
Fenwick, Ventura, CA, USA
The meek shall inherit the earth, and the cynical rich will end up on the dinner plates of the poor.
Colin, Carmarthen, UK
Too many people - not enough world
Peter, Oxford,
Let the poor starve and let the rich inherit their space.
kevin, Lincoln, UK
The use of food as fuel for cars is a crime against humanity. First priority is to feed the people. Greenpeace and Co are willing to kill 50% of human beings (starvation) because they think our planet cannot sustain its demographic growth.
Michel Jutharat, Marseille, France
Just increasing large farms in Africa will not solve the problem. The EU subsidizes its exports to non-EU countries and undermines the prices of local producers, and the US is not much better (its just a different kind of subsidy system). We do produce enough food to eradicate starvation since the end of the 80s. We just "distribute" it for profit and not for humanitarian reasons.
Margit, Frankfurt, FRG
To Jez from Leeds,
Idealism is unfortunately not the same thing as realism. Innovation is often also spurned by a need to gain a competitive edge, which in turn can come about from corporate 'greed', among other things (such as remaining viable). I'm not saying that gloabalization and the aspirations of world capitalism is the be all and end all, however I think people forget that without the sort of investment that only large corporations can provide, many of the worlds problems would be far worse.
Alasdair, Melbourne,
Farming is a rough, tough, mucky business that requires considerable physical stamina. The idea of rural peasants living a wholesome and fulfilling life belongs only in the pages of romantic fiction. Agriculture has always been an industrial process. Pragmatism is the order of the day. The pretty lamb in the field is sold for the best possible price and ends up cooked on your plate.
Colin, Carmarthen, UK
I agree 100% with this article.
The CAP should be abolished altogether, as should be US farm subsidies. Farming should operate as a free market. Food should be produced on an industrial scale all over the world. Farmers in the UK or elsewhere should not be protected. If they are not competitive, they should go out of business and someone else will buy up their land and increase their holding, thereby having an incentive to make the bigger farm more efficient.
The bans on GM crops should be lifted wherever they exist.
As for fuel from crops, well, there is an economic case for energy conservation. A huge amount of energy can be saved in the USA and Europe without a significant change of lifestyle and with moderate investment. There would be less of a case for growing crops to produce fuel as a result.
The world population is set to grow to 9 bn by 2050. This level is very much sustainable if only we stopped being afraid of science.
Fred, Luton,
Isn't it the case that many of the large agro-businesses engaged in the farming industry in Africa are far more interested in producing 'luxury' foods and products for Western markets (fine beans, sugar-snap peas, flowers) than staples for local markets? Heavy subsidies for American and European-grown grain mean that it is imported and sold below its real cost of production, to the detriment of the development of the grain production industries of importing nations.
Surely there can be no guarantee that increased globalization will work until emergent agricultural industries in the global south are able to compete on an even footing with the global north. That means, for starters, an end to Western subsidies for farmers (that old cookie), and secondly, some caps on exports (as in Argentina) to make production for domestic markets (be it smallholding production or agri-business) more attractive.
William, London, England
Just like there was a climate change denier lobby financed by oil companies I have the feeling the company who developed GM as a conduit for their selective weed-killer is infiltrating "scientific" publications. The environmentalists are not romantics we are people intelligent enough to see that if we continue the way we are we will end up living in caves, if we survive at all.
Vast tracks of GM plants, just like bio-fuels are the equivalent of CDOs in the current financial crisis. The only solution is to prevent world population from expanding here and overseas.
Esther Phillips, Leatherhead,
Farmers in the UK have been providing food at a loss for the last 10 years or so. All we have ever wanted is a fair price. A majority of grain was sold at 50% below todays current prices for Harvest 2007. We have seen fertiliser prices double in the last few months, fuel prices rise dramatically and pesticides increase by 25%. Our inputs are linked into oil and gas prices. There will be a lot of uk farmers struggling in the next few months and I would not be suprised if more go out of business due to cash flow problems. All we want is a fair price and a income - many farmers are living on working tax credits.
UK Farmer, Bedford,
Mr. Collier, just having more food around WILL NOT ERRADICATE POVERTY OR STARVATION for itself. There are already food surplusses in many parts of the world, such as the EU. The EU food surplus does not guarantee that african poor, or european poor for that matter, get their share. Poor people never get their fair share.. that is why they are caleed POOR.
So do not mix things: Food supplyies are one thing, poverty is another.
Rui, Lisbon,
Banning GM is not stupid it is the best thing we ever could have done, Having a farmers unable to grow seeds and replant them for free the next year is stupid.
GM crops will be abused so that farmers have to buy New gm seed every year year after year, meaning we are depented on forign intrests for a our seeds.
Never mind the damgae done to nature by introducing these buffed up version of plants that will kill many of our native species off.
Please get your facts right net time, jsut becsue america does something does not mean its a good idea, After all they give hand guns to 12 year olds.
MR W Jone, Liverpool, England
well, after another year or so of this ... demand (as well as prices) will come down because the number of consumers will have decreased
David Manning, Birmingham, UK
The current food crisis is NOT just a food crisis. It is a crisis in nutrition and starvation of the world's poor. The failure of the EU to rule in favor of the hungry poor is proof positive that their global warming stance is about world power ande not a force for good.
David, Minneapolis, USA
Why doesn't the EU accelerate the reform of the CAP and start using the fallow land owned by farmers who are paid not to use it- this in a world where agro products are now in short supply and prices rocketing? Time for common sense!
Tony, Birmingham, UK
The EU is also threatening farm production further - an impending ban on many of the chemicals commonly used to produce crops will devastate EU farming. Crop yields are expected to plummet. Stringent Nitrate Directives & Water Framework Directives are also imminent putting farm production at further risk. Add to this DEFRA's obsession with protecting the environment at the expense of food supply and you have a perfect recipe for future food shortages.
Paul, York, UK
More global co-operation.
Less corporate greed and zero big business manipulation of developing countries.
Jez W, Leeds,