The Environmental Food Crisis

ing grew by 16% from US$5.5 to US$6.4 trillion. In this period, the sales of food retailers increased disproportionately to the sales of food processors and companies in the food input indus- try. The sales of top food processors and traders grew by 13%, sales by the top 10 agricultural input countries by 8%, while the sales by top food retailers grew by 40% (IFPRI, 2007). However, on a global scale the agricultural input industry is more monop- olized than the food retail industry. In the agricultural input in- dustry, three agro-chemical corporations control approximately half the world market (UNCTAD, 2006), while the top five food retailers control only around 13% of the total market. Trade and urbanization affect consumer preferences. The rapid diversification of the urban diet cannot be met by the tradi- tional food supply chain in the hinterland of many developing countries. Consequently, importing food to satisfy the chang- ing food demand could be relatively easier and less costly than acquiring the same food from domestic sources. In Asia traditional rice-eating societies are consuming increas- ing quantities of wheat in the form of bread, cakes, pastry and other products (Pingali and Rosegrant, 1998). Countries that

traditionally imported rice for meeting food shortfalls may now be shifting towards increasing levels of wheat imports (Pingali, 2004). This trend is also evident in the import of other temperate products like vegetables, milk and dairy prod- ucts and temperate fruit. Net imports of this category of prod- ucts increased by a factor of 13 over the last 40 years, rising from a deficit of US$1.7 billion in 1961/1963 to US$24 bil- lion in 1997/1999 (Pingali, 2004). Between 1997/1999 and 2030, the cumulative increase in imports of these products is expected to be 154% and 17% for vegetable oils and oilseeds, while meat imports are expected to increase by 389%. The overall result is that we are beginning to see a homogeniza- tion of food tastes across the globe, but with regional varia- tions (Pingali, 2004). Poor connections between urban and rural areas hinder price transmissions towards local markets, broadening the gap be- tween urban demand and rural production in increasing de- mand for traditional products or for product diversification. The lack of access to markets is most evident in Africa, although large parts of Latin America and Asia are also experiencing long transport hours to reach markets (Figure 34). Consequently, do-

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