where is the revolution of the heart?

Costco confirmed today that it was seeing unusually large orders for rice , flour and other staples and that some of its stores had put restrictions in place as customers now aware of the global food crisis through the media start trying to hoard fearing shortages or just to avoid further price rises. A spokesman for Costco said that there was no shortage but large orders had seen stocks run out at some stores .

Whenever there is talk of shortages or looming disaster , people start to panic and act strangely, some might say ' rationally ' but some people view shortages and disasters as a source of profit and, no matter what we think of this, this is part of human nature and how so called free markets work.

One of the responses to the global food crisis has been for investors to look at ways to profit from it.

Take for example , fertiliser companies, they are now doing brisk trade because with world stocks of grains at a 17 year low , more crops and land being given over to biofuel production and improving standards of living in developing countries like China and India increasing demand farmers need to increase their yield , its the only real variable they can tweak , and so rising food prices are increasing demand for fertiliser and the smart money is being ploughed into phosphate firms as the price of fertiliser soars.

Meanwhile the Bush administration refutes charges that its biofuels policy , which has a quarter of all corn planted in the US diverted to biofuel production , is a major factor behind the world food crisis. It argues that there is an energy crisis and that rising fuel costs are pushing up food prices by increasing equipment operation and transport costs and that its biofuels policy is a well thought out iniative intended to tackle the energy crisis and combat carbon emissions and global warming in the long term.

Only that's not how the poorer countries see it.

They view using food and feed crops for fuel production at a time of low grain stocks and shortage as simply contemptuous of human life .The poorer countries are also the most affected by and the least responsible for global warming , which is already causing droughts , floods and crop failures, so now they need to spend more on fertilisers to increase yields to feed people whose subsistence incomes cant cope with any more price rises and their desperation is causing  political instability. Millions of people who were not on the World Food Programs hunger at risk list six months ago, now join it because they simply cant afford to eat as much as they need to at the current market rates.

The poorer countries are reacting to the food crisis, they are not in control, they are the hostages to the decisions taken by the leaders of the developed countries whose decision making meetings they never get invited to. They are being pummelled by market forces at every turn as  more and more countries turn to short sighted protectionist measures, more likely to add to world hunger than combat it. As usual though, even with this turbulence in the markets, there are winners and losers , the winners are making a killing , the losers face an uncertain future, including the very real risk of starving to death.

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