Corn climbed to a record near US$8 a bushel as floods damaged crops in the US, the largest producer and exporter, threatening global food supplies.
The flooding may be the worst in the Midwest since 1993 and will probably cause “hundreds of millions of dollars” of damage, the National Weather Service said.
US corn stockpiles may fall 53 percent to a 13-year low before next year’s harvest, the US Department of Agriculture said on June 10.
PHOTO:AFP
Record crude oil, wheat, rice and soybean prices this year have driven inflation, forcing governments to increase interest rates as the economy slows and raising production costs. Food and fuel costs have eclipsed the credit squeeze as the greatest threat to the world economy, the G8 said.
“Inflation pressures are building around the world,” stoked by food and fuel prices, David Cohen, director of Asian economic forecasting at Action Economics in Singapore, said by phone yesterday. That’s “squeezing household budgets, especially the poorest, and company profits.”
Corn gained as much as 3.5 percent to US$7.9150 a bushel in Chicago and has advanced 33 percent in the past two weeks. It’s up 86 percent in the past year on record demand for biofuels and livestock feed as rising Asian incomes increase meat consumption.
High food prices “are here to stay” as governments divert resources to make biofuels, amass stockpiles and limit exports, Peter Brabeck-Letmathe, chairman of Nestle SA, the world’s largest food company, said in an interview in Kuala Lumpur yesterday.
“Elevated commodity prices, especially of oil and food, pose a serious challenge to stable growth worldwide, have serious implications for the most vulnerable and may increase global inflationary pressure,” G8 finance ministers said in a statement released after a meeting in Osaka, Japan, on Saturday.
Consumer prices last month probably rose the most since 1997 in the UK and the fastest in 16 years in the euro area, while US producer prices are predicted to have gained 1 percent from April, according to economist forecasts.
More thunderstorms were expected on Sunday in the US Midwest, Accuweather.com forecast. As much as 30cm of rain dropped in the Midwest last week, and some fields had five times the normal moisture since the end of last month, the National Weather Service said.
Meanwhile, Argentine farmers intensified protests against higher export taxes after a farm leader was arrested by police, threatening to spark food shortages and halt the flow of grains in the country. Farmers began their fourth strike in three months on Sunday, withholding crops and blocking roads.
The country is the world’s third-largest soybean exporter behind the US and Brazil, and second only to the US for corn.
North Korea tested nuclear-capable rocket launchers, state media reported yesterday, a day after Seoul detected the launch of about 10 ballistic missiles. The test comes after South Korean and US forces launched their springtime military drills, due to run until Thursday. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un on Saturday oversaw the testing of the multiple rocket launcher system (MRLS), the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said. The test involved 12 600mm-caliber ultra-precision multiple rocket launchers and two artillery companies, it said. Kim said the drill gave Pyongyang’s enemies, within the 420km striking range, a sense of “uneasiness” and “a deep understanding
RECOGNITION: Former Fijian prime minister Mahendra Chaudhry said that Taiwan’s New Southbound Policy serves as a stabilizing force in the Indo-Pacific region Taiwan can lead the unification of the Chinese people, Nobel Peace Prize laureate and former Polish president Lech Walesa said in Taipei yesterday, adding that as the world order is changing, peaceful discussion would find good solutions, and that the use of force and coercion would always fail. Walesa made the remarks during his keynote address at a luncheon of the Yushan Forum in Taipei, titled “Indo-Pacific Partnership Prospects: Taiwan’s Values, Technology and Resilience,” organized by the Taiwan-Asia Exchange Foundation with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Walesa said that he had been at the forefront of a big peaceful revolution and “if
North Korea yesterday fired about 10 ballistic missiles to the sea toward Japan, the South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said, days after Pyongyang warned of “terrible consequences” over ongoing South Korea-US military drills. Pyongyang recently dashed hopes of a diplomatic thaw with Seoul, Washington’s security ally, describing its latest peace efforts as a “clumsy, deceptive farce.” Seoul’s military detected “around 10 ballistic missiles launched from the Sunan area in North Korea toward the East Sea [Sea of Japan] at around 1:20pm,” JCS said in a statement, referring to South Korea’s name for the body of water. The missiles
‘UNWAVERING FRIENDSHIP’: A representative of a Japanese group that co-organized a memorial, said he hopes Japanese never forget Taiwan’s kindness President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday marked the 15th anniversary of the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami, urging continued cooperation between Taiwan and Japan on disaster prevention and humanitarian assistance. Lai wrote on social media that Taiwan and Japan have always helped each other in the aftermath of major disasters. The magnitude 9 earthquake struck northeastern Japan on March 11, 2011, triggering a massive tsunami that claimed more than 19,000 lives, according to data from Japanese authorities. Following the disaster, Taiwan donated more than US$240 million in aid, making it one of the largest contributors of financial assistance to Japan. In addition to cash donations and
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