May be , but at least they won't have been stitched up solely , by their own Government eitherI suspect it won't be land of milk and honey in 27 countries near us either.
May be , but at least they won't have been stitched up solely , by their own Government eitherI suspect it won't be land of milk and honey in 27 countries near us either.
Cos we're not short of food , yetI remain baffled why Westminster don't see this as a problem.
it'll be a bit late to encourage a rush thru scrabble for some extra spring planting now ...by thenIf things don't change by next winter they will if not before
Animal feed or AD? Certainly not human food......Come on @Sid you’re brighter than that. What’s the by product from biofuel used for?
I’m fed up with hearing this simplistic food or fuel in the biofuel argument.
I am becoming more and more of the opinion that a lot of our MP's should have the nickname Richard Head!I remain baffled why Westminster don't see this as a problem.
Autumn, turn on the central heating and watch standards of living drop back to the dark ages.My guess is that nothing will change politicians minds until they begin to realise there will be a shortage of Christmas turkeys, and this penny probably won’t drop until the autumn.
isn't the midwest in the middle of a decade long droughtIn the 1960's I spent a number of years in northern India during the famine when rice & when wheat crops failed in abig way due to lack of monsoon rains.
Staple foodstuffs came from The USA under an USAID supply programme.What will happen in the coming months to europe & north africa is unknown,but I suspect that Uncle Sam does not have a massive exportable surplus to make up the shortfall from Russia & Ukraine.
I don't think he will change direction, rather direction will change with a change of leadership, where there is no Carrie or Goldsmith brothers anywhere near the levers of powerwe may have just saved ourselves from the extrems of their idea of our future , after the Ukraine conflict , this could have been the last harvest before it was largely irreversible , Boris will be looking at whats happening across the channel ploughing up the enviro strips etc to maximise grain production maybe he will change direction!
and, all this food produced with veggie oil is aiding our obesity epidemic with all the ultra processed food. Lard is far more healthy.Plenty of beef dripping in the uk to fry our beef and spuds and fish in instead of sunflower oil... its much cheaper too and we produce it here! Also loads of wool for heat insulation in our caves too.. whats not to like
credit: liam halligan
Even before Russia invaded Ukraine in late February, UK inflation was at a 30-year high. As we emerged from lockdown last year, and demand surged, the economy struggled to respond, pushing prices up.
Far from just a British problem, this reflected supply chain pressures across the world – as factories everywhere grappled with shortages of semiconductors and other vital inputs, as well as logistical and staff-related dislocation, the debilitating impact of lockdown proving difficult to shrug off.
Now, of course, Western sanctions on Russia, and Moscow’s countermeasures, have sent commodity markets into overdrive, pushing global inflation up much more.
America’s Consumer Prices Index rose 8.5pc during the year to March, the sharpest rise since December 1981. President Biden banned all oil and gas imports from Russia last month, with much being made of strong US production. Yet, US energy prices are still 32pc up on a year ago, according to official inflation data.
In the UK too, CPI inflation hit 7pc during the year to March, way beyond the Bank of England’s 2pc target. The Retail Price Index – a broader inflation measure including housing costs – was up 9pc in March.
Even more ominously, last month’s Producer Price Index – covering inputs firms use to produce what they then sell to us – was no less than 19.2pc higher than a year ago. Obscure PPI data has historically proved a good “leading indicator” of where headline inflation is going. Unless firms pass on elevated costs to consumers, they ultimately go bust.
Just as in the US, conflict-related energy price spikes are driving inflation higher in Britain too. Transport fuel prices jumped 30.7pc during the year to March, with household electricity prices up 18.1pc. Then there’s the 54pc rise in the Ofgem household energy price cap – in place since the start of April. That sent average utility bills for the 22 million households not on fixed-term deals up from just under £1,300 a year to almost £2,000.
This whopping rise isn’t reflected in the latest inflation numbers, of course, which relate to March. So CPI and RPI inflation will increase further, and PPI even more so, as the Ofgem cap doesn’t apply to firms. And with wholesale energy prices still sky-high, expect that cap to go up again this autumn.
Over recent weeks, as the economic fallout from this Russia-Ukraine conflict has become apparent, attention has focused on energy prices. That’s understandable given that Russia is an oil and gas superpower.
During the Cold war, western Europe’s reliance on Soviet energy exports, while barely mentioned, was never far from the minds of geopolitical strategists. Since then, of course, that reliance has grown.
Memories of the 1970s loom large, when successive oil price shocks – then due to politically-motivated Arab oil embargoes – hammered the West, as inflation soared, sparking stagnation and widespread trade union unrest. There are signs of that happening now.
Average UK wages rose by just 3.8pc over the past year, with inflation almost twice that and set to rise much higher. As earnings continue to lag the rising cost of living, industrial relations are definitely getting more scratchy.
And when the cost-of-living rises, and people have less purchasing power, the economy slows. Data last week showed the growth of retail sales stagnating. The UK’s post-pandemic recovery has most definitely lost its bounce.
Yet when it comes to serious economic fallout, it strikes me that what matters more about this Russia-Ukraine conflict than the impact on energy prices is the impact on the price of food.
The Western political and media class has yet fully to grasp the pivotal importance of Russia, Ukraine (and Russia’s ally Belarus) in the global agricultural supply chains. World food prices jumped nearly 13pc in March alone, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization’s price index, in large part due to the impact of this conflict.
Both Russia and Ukraine are major producers of wheat, barley and others crops – millions of tons of which are exported via Ukraine. Ordinarily, around a third of the world's grain exports are shipped from Black Sea ports, exports which have basically collapsed.
If the right political deals are struck, fuel supplies can be boosted pretty quickly. Embargoed energy from Russia (or Iran) can be released on global markets, or the Saudis can turn the spigot, bringing prices back from the stratosphere.
Yet crops need to be planted and animals reared over time – and this Russia-Ukraine conflict is messing with that. Not only is planting in Ukraine itself seriously disrupted, but as this war and related sanctions drive up fertiliser prices, that’s affecting planting much further afield too.
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus account for about two-fifths of world’s potash exports and between them export almost a third of fertilisers made from nitrogen and phosphorous. Pretty much all such exports are now blocked either by sanctions or conflict – one reason UK farmers are paying up to five times more for fertiliser than this time last year.
So just as UK food security is coming into focus, British farmers – hit with both spiralling fuel and fertiliser prices, their two main costs – are now planting less, not more. Rising feedstock prices, again linked to spiralling wheat and grain prices, are meanwhile causing the price not just of bread, but also eggs and milk to spiral.
Having said all that, the most serious economic fall-out from this Russia-Ukraine conflict, outside of Ukraine itself, will be felt beyond the West.
The world is, to a large extent, still eating crops harvested in 2021. We will soon switch to food produced this year. But sky-high fertiliser prices mean much less is now being planted – storing up a serious calorie deficit.
Already, in Egypt, the jump in the state aid needed to make traditional flatbread affordable for the poor is straining the Cairo government’s budget. In Turkey, cash-strapped shoppers are forming long lines to buy cheap, government-issued bread, now unaffordable on the open market.
The Arab Spring – the series of protests and armed rebellions that spread across North Africa and the Middle East in the early 2010s – was sparked and sustained in large part by spiralling food prices. These regions depend heavily on gigantic crop shipments, not least from Russia and Ukraine.
AD feedstockCome on @Sid you’re brighter than that. What’s the by product from biofuel used for?
I’m fed up with hearing this simplistic food or fuel in the biofuel argument.
My guess is that nothing will change politicians minds until they begin to realise there will be a shortage of Christmas turkeys, and this penny probably won’t drop until the autumn.
Or jobs.My guess is that nothing will change the politicians minds until they start to fear for their own safety.
Seasoned with dogshit@Janet Hughes Defra has been very quiet recently. Perhaps there is a rethink going on in DEFRA HQ but no one dare tell Eustice.
Carrie Johnson and the Goldsmith brothers should be fed a diet of lightly seasoned woodchip until they change their tune or are removed from any position of influence.
How do you know when a politician is not lying ?Unfortunately they are all much the same , we're about to go through hardship that most of us have never experienced before , wether large or small operators , ps , never ever believe a politician, NEVER
Yes and by then the goose will be well and truely cooked!My guess is that nothing will change politicians minds until they begin to realise there will be a shortage of Christmas turkeys, and this penny probably won’t drop until the autumn.
Yep I knowit'll be a bit late to encourage a rush thru scrabble for some extra spring planting now ...by then