THE INTERNATIONAL food shortage has rapidly climbed up the world's political agenda, as prices of staples like rice and wheat continue their steep increase and more governments take emergency measures to maintain basic supplies. People who spend 50-70 per cent of their small incomes on food are as shocked by these changes as the governments which have normally subsidised its supply to maintain social stability. International attention must now concentrate on how they can be managed to avoid political crises, allowing time for decisions on how the shortages can be tackled in the medium term.
To do that effectively it will be necessary to understand why they have happened. Increasing use of biofuels to offset fossil energy, climate change effects like droughts, desertification and floods, growing demand for meat in China and India, world population pressure, export restrictions, hoarding, and speculation by hedge funds have all been identified as factors.
These changes have starkly highlighted how unequally the world's resources are distributed and the likelihood that the poorest people will bear the greatest burden of this traumatic adjustment, in which food and energy crises are intertwined. They also reveal how vulnerable are many governments to rebellious populations if solutions are not rapidly found. Some 33 countries are now in danger of political instability and domestic unrest because of food price inflation, according to the World Bank. The rush to biofuels has been aptly described as a "crime against humanity" by Jean Ziegler, the United Nations special rapporteur for food. Fuel and food are being priced at equivalent levels in many parts of the world, effectively stealing from the poor to subsidise rich car drivers in developed states.
This irrational stampede must be stopped and reversed, taking due account of where biofuels can be most efficiently produced - in Brazil much more than Europe, for example. Deep changes in agricultural production, productivity and investment are required, as is highlighted in this week's valuable report from scientists present at a conference in Alexandria. In the medium term it should be possible to turn this twin food price and energy shock to advantage in several parts of the world - including Ireland as a food exporting nation privileged with natural competitive advantages. The shift in terms of trade towards agricultural producers could be of great benefit to African agriculture, if the expertise, resources and capacity are properly mobilised to expand its economic potential. Ireland could take a lead here, given the special relationships built up over the years by the now rapidly increasing development aid programme. It must respond with vision and commitment to these changes.
Above all, political will and commitment is needed to tackle these problems with the radicalism and imagination they need. A purely reactive defence of the Common Agricultural Policy by Irish farmers is short-sighted in the midst of a world food crisis. It is high time the debate on agriculture here and throughout the world was conducted on a more informed plane.