Global Food Prices Up Sharply; 37 Countries Face Food Crises

/ Agriculture

The soaring cost of food is threatening millions of people in poor countries, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has warned.

Food prices have risen an unprecedented 40% in the last year and many nations may be unable to cope, the agency says.

It is calling for help for farmers in poor countries to buy seeds and fertiliser, and for a review of the impact of bio-fuels on food production.

The FAO says 37 countries face food crises due to conflict and disaster.

"Without support for poor farmers and their families in the hardest-hit countries, they will not be able to cope," said FAO Director-General Jacques Diouf.

The agency's food price index has jumped almost 40% from last year, hitting its highest level since its inception in 1990.

The increases are partly due to droughts and floods linked to climate change, as well as rising oil prices boosting demand for bio-fuels, the FAO said.

Changing diet in fast-developing nations such as China is also considered a factor, with more land needed to raise livestock to meet increasing demand for meat.

The Tiresome Subject of One’s Own Affairs

/ Conduct, Environment

I just find that sitting down by a tree or a rock and contemplating the natural scene, any natural scene, in an appreciative, quietly passive way can distract one for a while from the tiresome subject of one's own affairs. Not that this is something I do all that often. My interest in the natural world has always tended to be too involved, too protective and meddlesome, to allow much time for just sitting around looking at things. But whenever I have managed it, I've come back to myself afterwards feeling more calm and clear-headed, more capable of dealing with the way of the world than when I left.

-- Don Schueler, A Handmade Wilderness (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1996), 171-72.