Finance Ministers Emphasize Food Crisis Over Credit Crisis

WASHINGTON — The world’s economic ministers declared on Sunday that shortages and skyrocketing prices for food posed a potentially greater threat to economic and political stability than the turmoil in capital markets.

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NVDL: It might be possible for the stupid and deluded masses to begin to see the obvious signals now. High oil prices = high food prices + climate change = higher food prices + increased activity to attempt to continue our easy motoring culture (eg biofuel farming) = increased climate change + higher fuel/food prices = wiping out the poor, then the middle class. The poor and middle class won't take kindly to being wiped out, and the backlash will herald a particularly austere period for a world that is already de-stabilised for its own reasons. In a period where human communities need to be particularly effective, organised and able to mobilise, we will most likely resort to chaos and war, making the situation worse (for ourselves), but at least by and large the problem of over-consumption, excessive demand etc will be solved by a self-culling of our species. Equilibrium after aftershoot demands a crash, and it is likely to be spectacularly catastrophic.

Sorry if this sounds doomsdayish. If your house is burning and you wake the person up and say, "Your house is burning," he is perfectly entitled to say, "That's very negative; the end of the world is by no means nigh, and besides, looking around me I can't see or smell anything that would lead me to believe you," and go back to sleep. But the person who sees the curtains curling up in flames and the persian carpets starting to smoke is also perfectly justified to prod the sleeper awake and at least attempt to let him know - unpleasant as the news is - what is happening and what is imminently going to happen.

Calling it 'doomsday' is the sort of dismissive attitude to bad news that has gotten humanity slogging through shit filled marshlands.

Fuel Choices, Food Crises and Finger-Pointing

Food riots contributed to the dismissal of Haiti’s prime minister last week, and leaders in some other countries are nervously trying to calm anxious consumers...ethanol and similar fuels, are driving up food prices and starving poor people.

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World Bickering Starts As Oil Prices (and their implications) Bite

Brent Crude Oil is now $109.34 (up 0.54%), and we can already clearly see how countries (and their populations) are dealing with higher food and fuel prices. They're moaning. In many countries there are mass protests. Blame, argue, jump up and down. Prices are going to get worse, not better, and people's reactions, in step, will become more inflamed.

New wave of food protests

At least two dozen deaths have been reported in riots sparked by a sharp increase in food and fuel prices around the world, most recently in Egypt, Senegal, Cameroon and Côte d'Ivoire.

We can generally anticipate (in South Africa in particular) a worsening scenario with regard to the affordability of basic services. Civilian reactions are likely to exacerbate these conditions, culminating in civil strife, looting, burning and pillaging.