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Climate ‘could devastate crops’
BBC
Climate change could cause severe crop losses in South Asia and southern Africa over the next 20 years, a study in the journal Science says.
The findings suggest southern Africa could lose more than 30% of its main crop, maize, by 2030.
In South Asia losses of many regional staples, such as rice, millet and maize could top 10%, the report says.
The effects in these two regions could be catastrophic without effective measures to adapt to climate change.
The majority of the world’s one billion poor depend on agriculture for their livelihoods. Yet, said lead author David Lobell, it is also “the human enterprise most vulnerable to climate change”.
The researcher, from Stanford University in California, US, added: “Understanding where these climate threats will be greatest, for what crops and on what timescales, will be central to our efforts at fighting hunger and poverty over the coming decades.”
(31 January 2008)
ACCC to investigate fertiliser prices
ABC News (Australia)
The Federal Government has asked the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) to investigate fertiliser prices, as part of the wider look into the cost of groceries.
Fertiliser is now so expensive and in such short supply that it will be out of reach of many farmers this season.
Two years ago, it cost $400 a tonne, but now costs $1,000 a tonne.
Liberal Senator Bill Heffernan has called for a Senate inquiry.
Competition Minister Chris Bowen will not agree to that, but says he will incorporate it into the ACCC’s grocery prices inquiry.
He says it is appropriate for the ACCC to investigate whether there is any anti-competitive conduct going on.
Although half of Australia’s fertiliser is produced locally, the industry is still blaming a global shortage and high shipping costs.
(1 February 2008)
Cultural blinders: if prices rise, it MUST be something wrong with the market. -BA
Mexican Farmers Protest End of Corn-Import Taxes
James C. McKinley Jr.
MEXICO CITY – Tens of thousands of farmers clogged the streets of the capital on Thursday to protest the end of tariffs on corn from the United States, warning that the elimination of trade barriers could drive them out of business and lead more Mexicans to migrate north.
The farmers brought a herd of cattle and more than 50 tractors to make their point, jamming the historic center and blocking the central artery, Paseo de la Reforma. One rowdy group burned a tractor.
Stretching for more than four miles, the march was a sea of tanned faces, cowboy hats, flags and calloused hands gripping banners with slogans like “Without farms there is no country.” The police said at least 50,000 people joined the protest; organizers put the number at 100,000.
“We cannot compete against this monster, the United States,” said one farmer, Enrique Barrera Pérez, who is 44 and works about five acres in Yucatán. “It’s not worth the trouble to plant. We don’t have the subsidies. We don’t have the machinery.”
(1 February 2008)
