Climate Change > Food Crisis

We've all felt the price of our food shop go up recently. The papers are full of advice on how to economise - bring lunch in from home, spice up those leftovers. In fact, the price of food has nearly doubled in just three years. People who live in developing countries, who spend between 50% and 80% of their income on food, are bearing the brunt of the crisis. There are a number of causes, but we're not helping by rushing to fuel cars instead of people.

There have been protests and riots in places as far apart as Haiti, Egypt and the Philippines. Oxfam is particularly concerned about the growing threat of hunger in northern Kenya, Ethiopia, Somalia and Eritrea and has launched an appeal for urgent help to keep people there alive.

So what's behind the food crisis? Poor harvests in big food-producing countries, such as Australia, probably as a result of climate change, have hit food supplies. Increased oil prices have meant producing and transporting food has become much more expensive and the demand for food has increased as diets improve in China and India. As the price of food has gone up, speculators have been attracted to the market. And we've been literally adding fuel to the fire by using food crops to create biofuels.

What can we do?