Rising energy and commodity prices helped create the global food crisis, which fed the financial crisis.

The higher prices of food and energy depress real incomes further.

The struggle to meet rising food and energy prices is hard enough.

As food prices rise, so is hunger and poverty.

Shortages of natural gas increased fertilizer prices, pushing up food prices.

The year began with rising food, oil, and commodity prices, giving rise to the specter of high inflation.

The high price of oil

Food prices are the same in the two countries, while in the second country, the price of cloth is five times higher than the price of food.

This is important to bear in mind, because rising food prices have historically been the trigger for political revolutions.

Niger food crisis 2005

Malawi food crisis 2005

Now, by contrast, food and gasoline prices are rising, owing to emerging markets ongoing boom, while house prices continue to plummet.

Record high food and energy prices, combined with sharply rising wages in China, are pushing up inflation in much of the world.

Inflation was on the rise before the recession of 2008 struck, mainly because of spiking commodity prices.

On its heels came the global financial crisis, which also hit the poorest the hardest.

And low income economies are suffering from higher food and fuel prices, which feature heavily in households consumption baskets.

Do Low Interest Rates Ensure High Asset Prices?

Special even on Food crisis in Africa

In Peru, social mobilization against higher food prices led to a renegotiation of the free trade agreement with the US.

The global food crisis will not go away by itself.

Africa's food crisis as a threat to peace and security.

Higher food prices meant that poor people, already struggling to meet basic human needs, were pushed deeper into poverty.

A Good Rate Hike for Europe

The surge in food and energy prices is a major emergency for many of these countries, and it needs to be managed carefully.

The high food and fuel prices that prevailed until recently have taken a heavy toll on the finances of many African economies.

History shows that rising inflation is eventually followed by higher nominal interest rates.

None of these measures was uncontroversial nor did they prevent the impact of today s global food price inflation.

Indeed, some analysts believe that such restrictions were a principal cause of food price rises in 2008.

Rising food and energy prices pushed inflation up to 9.7 in May, from 8.2 in April.

The rush towards bio fuels has also strongly contributed to rising food prices, which have tipped another roughly 30 million people into starvation.

Rural Alaska suffers from extremely high prices for food and consumer goods compared to the rest of the country, due to the relatively limited transportation infrastructure.

First, it has contributed to rising oil prices.

Consequently, oil prices increase.

The Silver Lining in High Commodity Prices

According to the FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations), urban poor consumers spend between 60 and 80 percent of their income on food, making them very vulnerable to higher food prices.

The food price crisis of two years ago served as a wake up call, and has created an opportunity to revisit existing agricultural policies.

An expectation that interest rates will be high sometime in the next decade should mean high interest rates on long term bonds today.

Can High Oil Prices Be Good?

No quick fix exists for oil prices.

The variance is due mainly to an increase in fuel prices.

As oil prices go up, energy patents go up.

And this pathetic performance comes at a time when many African economies agricultural sectors are booming on the back of high world food prices.

Because crude oil is priced in US dollars, and the dollar has depreciated against the euro, European consumers have gotten off relatively easy from rising energy prices.

Initially, however, the international strategy treated the debt crisis in many countries as a short term liquidity problem, set off by unusually high international interest rates and recession induced low prices of commodities.

Combined with increasing demand from those with higher incomes and lower supplies due to weather related problems associated with climate change, this means high food prices a lethal threat to developing countries.