World Bank: Food Prices Up 36% Since Last Year

Driven in part by higher fuel costs connected to events in the Middle East and North Africa, global food prices are 36 percent above their levels a year ago, according to new data released by the World Bank.

"More poor people are suffering and more people could become poor because of high and volatile food prices,” said World Bank Group President Robert B. Zoellick at his press conference today.

The World Bank’s food price index, which measures global prices, is 36 percent above its level a year earlier and remains close to its 2008 peak. Key increases compared to a year ago include maize (74 percent), wheat (69 percent), soybeans (36 percent) and sugar (21 percent), although rice prices have been stable. In many countries, vegetables, meats, fruits and cooking oil continued to rise with potentially adverse nutritional consequences for the poor.

Most remarkably, given Federal Reserve money printing policies, the strongest food price inflation, at least for the United States is very likely to be still ahead.