Here are two stories, a world apart yet intimately related. In the United States, public policy supports immense subsidies for corn production. Unfortunately not all corn is edible. Only certain varities are and in the United States, the subsidies are geared for the production of corn for industrial purposes. In recent years, the production of sweet corn in the United States has increased slightly but overall corn production has more than tripled. According to USDA reports, commercial corn production in 2007 surpassed $860 million in value, with over 631,000 acres under production. In 1997, there were 222,800 acres under production. Acres under production for corn has almost tripled which means that acreage for other crops have declined. That in turn puts pressure of the prices of those commodities.

Our first story is how a decision by India is impacting the chicken industry in Malaysia. Globalisation created a link and now with that link broken, the impact is going to be felt hardest by Malaysia’s poor.

India Maize Export Ban Impacts Malaysia
It is called the ripple effect. India banned exports of maize through at least mid-October not just to Malaysia but world-wide. India, the world’s sixth largest maize producer, is effectively putting its food security first. What worries India is that if it sells its maize now, when India needs to then go on the world market later India will either face a much higher price or it won’t find the maize it needs at all. In effect, India has chosen to hoard. You can’t blame India, it does have a billion mouths to feed.

In Malaysia, maize from India makes up 95% of the chicken feed. It has therefore come as a huge blow to the farmers in the region when it was announced that exports from India into the country were halted.

“In just two days, the price of maize jumped from RM980 (US$270) per tonne to RM1,200 (US$370),” said president of the Federation of Livestock Farmers Associations of Malaysia (FLFAM), Lee Ah Fatt. “With India barring the export, the price of maize will escalate further thus hurting farmers,” he added.

It has been reported that Ah Fatt called on the chicken farmers in the country to cut production by 10-15% to reduce losses.

For now, Malaysia is importing maize feed from Thailand but it can not make up the difference. The impact on Malaysian consumers will be fewer but more expensive chicken meat. Ayam soto tidak.

US Catfish Farms Dry Up for Lack of Feed
In the United States, the rise in grain feed for livestock is impacting the industry. In the case of the catfish industry, it is decimating it. The main competitor to the US catfish industry is Vietnam and with the rise in grain feed, the US can’t compete with lower cost producer Vietnam. The story from the New York Times:

Catfish farmers across the South, unable to cope with the soaring cost of corn and soybean feed, are draining their ponds.

It’s a dead business,” said John Dillard, who pioneered the commercial farming of catfish in the late 1960s. Last year Dillard & Company raised 11 million fish. Next year it will raise none. People can eat imported fish, Mr. Dillard said, just as they use imported oil.

As for his 55 employees? “Those jobs are gone.”

Corn and soybeans have nearly tripled in price in the last two years, for many reasons: harvest shortfalls, increasing demand by the Asian middle class, government mandates for corn to produce ethanol and, most recently, the flooding in the Midwest.

This is creating a bonanza for corn and soybean farmers but is wreaking havoc on consumers, who are seeing price spikes in the grocery store and in restaurants. Hog and chicken producers as well as cattle ranchers, all of whom depend on grain for feed, are being severely squeezed.

(more…)

Here is the Friday, July 18th, 2008 edition of news and events from the around the world.

Belgian Crisis
The King of Belgium has refused to accept the resignation of his prime minister, but has put the immediate political future of the country in the hands of three other people. More including a video report from Euro News. And Fistful of Euros offers some commentary on Belgie versus Belgique. Flanders Today offers a Flemish perspective.

Tensions between Thailand and Cambodia Worsen
A Cambodian general said a border standoff between his soldiers and Thai troops came close to a shoot-out overnight as the confrontation over disputed territory surrounding an ancient temple entered its fourth day Friday. Reports from Radio Australia and the BBC.

ASEAN Ministers to Meet to Discuss Oil Prices on the Region
Ministers from the 10-nation Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) are expected to hammer out possible solutions to rising oil and food prices amid warnings inflation could threaten political stability, officials said. The problem, if left unchecked, could pose a challenge to the region’s long-term aim of evolving into a European Union-style community where goods and services are freely traded across the region by 2015, they said. At meetings to begin Sunday night, the ministers were to discuss “the growing challenge posed by rising oil and food prices, which pose a serious challenge to our people’s welfare as well as our countries’ continued economic development,” according to a draft joint communique obtained by Agence France Presse.

Guinea-Bissau and the Cashew Nut
It’s not even native to Africa (it is from the Amazon), but the Cashew Nut is the mainstay of the economy of the small West African country of Guinea-Bissau, one of the poorest countries in the world. In one survey by the United Nations, Guinea-Bissau ranks as the third poorest. World News Net looks at Guinea-Bissau and the cocktail nut.

Bali Bombers Lose Their Final Appeal
Three men convicted over the 2002 Bali bombing have no more legal avenues to appeal against their executions, the Denpasar District Court confirmed today. More from the Courier Mail of Australia.

After the Swap
After swap, Israel fears Hezbollah will escalate tensions in north. Haaretz looks at how Israel now views Hezbollah.

Has The US Stopped Arms Sales to Taiwan?
If so, it is a huge mistake. The top US military commander in Asia acknowledged Wednesday that US arms sales to Taiwan had been frozen, amid warming ties between Beijing and Taipei and concerns expressed by China.

“There have been no significant arms sales from the United States to Taiwan in relatively recent times,” said Admiral Timothy Keating, commander of the Hawaii-based US Pacific Command.

Keating told a forum of the Washington-based Heritage Foundation he was aware of a freeze on US arms sales to Taiwan, saying it was “administration policy.”

The report from Agence France Presse.

UK Natural Gas Prices Could Rise 70%
The UK Guardian reports that natural gas prices are set to soar in the UK and then remain high for the foreseeable future, a report has revealed. The independent report commissioned by Centrica, which owns British Gas, warns that prices could increase by 70%. Jake Ulrich, managing director of Centrica Energy, admitted that gas price rises were likely to lead to a “potentially significant” rise in the number of people in fuel poverty. He also predicted that people would have to change their habits to deal with higher prices.

Return to Main

Talk about drama. In the clip below from Argentine television, the Vice President of Argentina Julio Cobos explains his vote on the government’s export tax policies. The clip is in Spanish but worth a look even if you don’t understand Spanish just to see Argentina’s government squirm literally. The vote was taken at 4:25 AM in Buenos Aires and set off celebrations across the country among those hardy enough to await the outcome.

Ganó el campo
In a severe blow to the government of Argentina over its export taxes on a wide array of agricultural products, President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner tonight lost the vote in the Argentine Senate by one vote. Her own Vice President Julio Cobos cast the decisive no vote against her tax policy. The New York Times reports:

In a cliffhanging ballot after more than 18 hours of debate, Argentina’s Senate voted early Thursday to reject agricultural export tax increases that inspired months of protests by rebellious farmers.

The outcome — a severe setback for the government of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner — was uncertain to the very end, when Vice President Julio Cobos cast a tie-breaking vote to end a 36-36 deadlock between opponents and supporters of the legislation.

Mr. Cobos had angered Mrs. Kirchner in recent weeks by speaking out in favor of the farmers.

The vote was the climax of a saga that began in March when President Kirchner imposed the tax measures. Facing plummeting approval ratings, Mrs. Kirchner took the calculated risk last month of sending the measure to Congress for debate. Supporters of Mrs. Kirchner’s Peronist bloc control both house of Congress.

The lower house approved the tax system earlier this month by just seven votes after debating for 19 hours. But approval by the Senate was critical for the government.

(more…)

Here is the Wednesday, July 16th, 2008 edition of interesting reads from around the world.

ICC Warrant for Omar al-Bashir
Egypt, China and Algeria voiced concerns over the warrant for the arrest for the Sudanese President on charges of war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity. “China expresses grave concern and misgivings about the International Criminal Court prosecutor’s indictment of the Sudanese leader,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao told a regularly scheduled news conference in Beijing. The Washington Post covers the Chinese response while Xinhua Net covers Algeria’s. Lastly, an op-ed from the Wall Street Journal.

Malaysia’s Anwar Ibrahim Arrested
Police arrested Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim on Wednesday, less than an hour before a deadline for him to appear at police headquarters to answer allegations that he sodomized a male aide. Details from Al Jazeera.

Chávez-Correa-Ortega Summit in Manta, Ecuador
The Presidents of Venezuela, Ecuador and Nicaragua are meeting in Manta, Ecuador (home to a US military base slated to close in 2010) this week. Their gathering is to celebrate the beginning of construction of the Refinería del Pacífico, the largest oil refinery on the west coast of South America. Chávez has made clear that he wants to increase Venezuela oil sales to Asia and diminish sales to the United States. More (in Spanish) from Noticias 24.

Egypt After Mubarak
The Los Angeles Times has a feature on Omar Suleiman, the head of Egypt’s foreign intelligence service. The article ponders whether Suleiman may be the next in line for Egypt’s Presidency. Not that Mubarak is going anywhere. Elections, such as they are in Egypt, are not due until 2011 on the one hand and on the other, we may yet see a Mubarak dynasty rise in the land of the Pharoahs. Gamal Mubarak is also being groomed for the Presidency.

Japan-Korea Squabble over Islets
Korea’s Ambassador to Japan Kwon Chul-hyun temporarily returned to Seoul yesterday in protest over Tokyo’s claim that the Dokdo islets in the East Sea belong to Japan. The Korea Herald covers the story from Seoul while the Japan Times takes up the story from Tokyo. The story has great importance in Korea than in Japan. However, there are plans for demonstrations later this week in Seoul and South Koreas has cancelled a cultural exchanged slated for August.

Fishermen Strike in Tokyo
The National Federation of Fisheries Cooperative Associations and 16 other fishing industry bodies launched a strike involving some 200,000 fishing boats Tuesday to protest against the fuel price increases. Japanese fishermen’s one-day strike cut Wednesday’s fish supplies on the Metropolitan Central Wholesale Market in Tokyo’s Tsukiji by 20 percent from the previous day to 401 tons, prompting wholesalers to warn further strikes would induce a serious supply disruption, market officials said. “Prices of some fish underwent increases of some 10 percent” due to supply decreases, a market source said after morning auctions. Such fish included flatfish and sea bream from Japan’s home waters. They are often used by up-scale sushi shops.

Indian No Confidence Vote Scheduled for July 21
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s UPA government will introduce a measure of confidence on July 21, 2008 over the US-India Nuclear deal according to The Hindu. This article from The Hindu lays out the government’s case why the pact should be approved. Opposition to the deal is coming largely from leftist parties, including the Indian Communist Party, that feel that the deal impinges on India’s sovereignty.

Drug Gangs Blamed in Guatemalan Lawyer’s Killing
President Elias Antonio Saca of El Salvador blamed drug gangs for the killing of a Guatemalan state prosecutor who was investigating the murder of three Salvadoran deputies to the Central American Parliament. Juan Carlos Martinez was shot Monday while driving near his home southeast of Guatemala City. The three Salvadoran deputies were killed in February 2007. Eduardo D’Aubuisson, William Pichinte and Jose Ramon Gonzalez were deputies in the Guatemala-based regional Central American parliament from El Salvador’s conservative ruling ARENA party. The remains of a fourth man were found with them. Villagers discovered their bodies in a blazing car up a dirt track an hour’s drive east of Guatemala City. The suspected murderers are members of Guatemala’s police force but they are being protected by Guatemala’s military establishment. None have been charged.

Russia’s Medvedev Criticizes the West
President Dmitri A. Medvedev chided the West for paternalism in a foreign policy speech in which he criticized the United States and Western Europe for creating a missile defense shield and for recognizing Kosovo’s independence. More from the New York Times.

Return to Main

Cross-posted from The Global Sociology Blog. My posts, my views.

Via the BBC,

“Demand for land to grow food, fuel crops and wood is set to outstrip supply, leading to the probable destruction of forests, a report warns.”

The report in question was drafted by the coalition Rights and Resources Initiative focused on global forest policy. They advocate sustainable management of forestry as well as respects for the people living in and from the forests in their rights not to be forcibly displaced by logging companies who deprive them of their livelihood. As stated in the BBC,

““Arguably, we are on the verge of a last great global land grab,” said RRI’s Andy White, co-author of the major report, Seeing People through the Trees.

“It will mean more deforestation, more conflict, more carbon emissions, more climate change and less prosperity for everyone.”

Rising demand for food, biofuels and wood for paper, building and industry means that 515 million hectares of extra land will be needed for growing crops and trees by 2030, RRI calculates.

But only 200 million hectares will be available without dipping into tropical forests.”

Well, for logging companies and well as the biofuel and ranging sector, there is no problem: let’s just tap into these tropical forests. But this would make climate change worse since deforestation already accounts for 20% of carbon emissions. But the need for both fuel and food has triggered land speculation and whatever the global financial markets want, they usually get. It is a very unequal battle between Big Money and the rights of indigenous people to land.

(more…)

Cross-posted from The Global Sociology Blog. My post, my views.

As an addendum to my post of the Bhopal disaster, I would like to bring into the discussion the Risk Society theory that is, in my view, fundamental to the understanding of contemporary society in the global context.

What do the Bhopal industrial disaster, the Chernobyl nuclear reactor meltdown, the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, the epidemics of mad cow disease, and the widespread use of genetically modified crops have in common? According to German sociologist Ulrich Beck, they all indicate the rise of a world risk society.

According to Beck (1992), the world risk society is a product of modernity. Since the industrial revolution, one of the major large-scale societal issues was the reduction of scarcity. The solution was to develop and use technology to produce enormous numbers of goods and increase the general level of wealth for the populations of industrial societies. This was successful: scarcity is hardly a problem in post-industrial societies (core areas). If anything, abundance is. Generally speaking, people no longer starve in developed countries, quite the contrary, obesity has become a problem.

However, this mass production of goods has been accompanied by the production of “bads” or, in other words, risks. Beck defines risk as “a systematic way of dealing with hazards and insecurities induced and introduced by modernization itself. Risks, as opposed to older dangers, are consequences which relate to the threatening force of modernization and to its globalization of doubt" (1992: 21). As such, risks have several characteristics that distinguish them from dangers in previous periods of human history.

(more…)

Here is the Tuesday, July 8th, 2008 edition of interesting reads from around the world.

Iraq Calls For US Pullout Timetable
Iraq’s prime minister has for the first time publicly called for a US troop withdrawal timetable. Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said on Monday that a military agreement the two countries are negotiating should include provisions for the withdrawal of American troops. More from Al Jazeera. It should be interesting to see how this plays in the US Presidential election.

G-8 Agrees Climate Change Deal to Halve Emissions
Leaders of G-8 agree to adopt goal of at least halving greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. 2050? And they are calling this a breakthrough. I shudder to think what their definition of failure is. The UK Guardian has all the bloody details.
Meanwhile, African leaders have pressed the Group of Eight (G8) industrialised nations to control oil and food prices. This story from Al Jazeera. And a video report on the summit from the Associated Press:

India Won’t Accept Carbon Emissions Targets
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has said emphatically that India would not accept any targets that may be set by international bodies reducing its carbon emissions. Full details in The Hindu. Prime Minister Singh is to meet with US President Bush and other G-8 leaders tomorrow. On the table for US-India talks is the US-India Nuclear Agreement. More this story also from The Hindu.

India Suspends Maize Exports Until October 15, 2008
The Indian Government has already banned exports of wheat, non-basmati rice, edible oil and pulses. This just further puts pressure on global food markets but India is thinking of its own food security. To me, this reads as a repeat of the 1930s when countries acted to protect their own interests and thereby exacerbated the Stock Market Crash of October 1929 and turned it into a world-wide depression that lasted over a decade. India is the sixth largest supplier of corn in the world so its retreat from the global markets is not insignificant. Couple this with the mess in Argentina and we have a real crisis on our hands. This follows a very worrisome report out of China earlier this week that China faces a grain shortage. All About Feed has the details on this story.

China faces serious challenges in ensuring it will have enough grain to feed its population in the decades to come, according to Premier Wen Jiabao.

Industrialisation, urbanisation and a growing population are boosting grain demand while “shrinking arable land, water shortage and climate change is an increasing constraint on output,” Wen told a cabinet meeting.

“The long-term demand and supply will be balanced but tight and ensuring grain security faces serious challenges,” he said.

The meeting approved a mid- and long-term grain security plan that aims to keep the nation’s annual grain output above 500 million tonnes by 2010 and increase production to more than 540 million tonnes a year by 2020.

Litvinenko Murder Intrigue Resurfaces
The murder of former Russian agent Alexander Litvinenko was carried out with the backing of the Russian state, Whitehall sources have told the BBC.

Sondhi Limthongkul’s Corporatist Vision for Thailand
With Thailand now of its second month of intense political protests, opposition leader Sondhi Limthongkul is proposing reforms that to me sound rather corporatist. Sondhi Limthongkul, the core leader of the People’s Alliance for Democracy, has called for a “New Politics.”

The New Politics turns out to be a startlingly reactionary proposal to move Thailand’s parliamentary system towards a form of appointed corporatism, or what might be called a selectoral democracy. Thirty percent of MPs would come from elections, perhaps one per province, and the rest of MPS would derive from various occupations and associations. Sondhi says the proportion is not fixed, it’s up for debate.

The rationale for wanting to dismantle Thailand’s electoral system is evident: pro-Thaksin forces keep winning elections. And as Thaksin is said to represent everything bad about Thai politics, he can not be allowed to wield power directly or indirectly. Thus, for Sondhi, and it would seem the PAD leadership as whole, there is now a need to bring about a revolution in political representation.

The full story in the Asia Sentinel.

Taiwan Exports Rise to Record Levels
Taiwan’s exports in June rose 21.3% from a year earlier to a record high of US$24.35 billion on rising demand from parts of Asia and Europe, the government said July 7. The June figure compared with a 20.5% rise to $23.60 billion recorded in May. More from Industry Week.

11 Bodies Found in Tijuana Over 3 Days
As a Colombian, I have seen this all before and it is worrisome that it is happening now in Mexico. What we have endured in Colombia is not something that I would wish on anyone. It is thus that I say with alarm that Mexico’s drug wars require serious attention. We will see bombings. Drug mafias will stop at nothing and only a strong response from the state and civil society can stop them. They will infiltrate politics. They can buy anything and anyone. Act now.

Police discovered the tortured and burned bodies of six men in an empty lot Monday morning, ending a period of relative calm in this border city beset by drug war violence.

Eleven bodies have been discovered since Saturday in violence believed to be drug-related, including the corpse of a woman found in a barrel, state and federal authorities said.

The weekend tally pushed the city’s death toll this year to more than 260, compared with about 152 homicides at this time last year, and underscored authorities’ difficulties curbing organized crime.

The full story from the Los Angeles Times. A 71% rise in drug-related homocides in Tijuana is not something to be taken lightly.

Syria To Restore Diplomatic Ties with France
Syria’s top diplomat in London says Damascus will soon send a new ambassador to Paris and end a freeze on diplomatic ties. Sami Khiyami says a new representative will likely be sent to France in the very near future. Syria has not had an ambassador in Paris since 2006. The report is from Haaretz.

Return to Main

Cross-posted from The Global Sociology Blog. My post, my views.

In the past months, I have blogged rather extensively on the food crisis and the relationship to the growth of biofuels (see here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here). In the context of the G8 meeting, the correlation between biofuel growth, poverty and hunger / food scarcity is again at the forefront of the discussions. As Ashley Seager puts it in the Guardian,

“The G8’s push for greater biofuel use has been a significant factor in driving 760 million people into food insecurity and putting them at risk of hunger in the past two years, ActionAid says today.

Released before next week’s G8 summit in Hokkaido, Japan, the charity’s report, Cereal Offenders, says the 82% rise in food commodity prices since 2006 has directly pushed 260 million people into risk of hunger as a result of the rich world’s drive for biofuels.”
(more…)

Here is the Saturday, July 5th, 2008 edition of what is making news around the world.

UK Guardian Exclusive On Fraud in Zimbabwe
The UK Guardian has exclusive report on the fraud committed in Zimbabwe. Robert Mugabe’s henchmen have long been suspected of stealing civil servant postal ballots. This GuardianFilms exclusive provides the first evidence of how they did it. The clip is on my user page at the Guardian. In addition, this story from the Washington Post describes Mugagbe’s tactics.

Argentine Congress to Vote on Export Taxes
Argentina’s lower house of Congress was preparing to vote late Friday night on whether to approve a government tax program for agricultural exports in the latest chapter of a bitter battle between farmers and the government of President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner. More from the New York Times.

Malaysian Fuel Hike Protests
Malaysia’s opposition-backed protesters held a mass rally against a steep hike in fuel prices, despite a police warning that it was illegal according to this report from the International Herald Tribune.

Calm Returns to Ulan Bator
Reuters reports that troops began pulling back from the streets of the Mongolian capital on Saturday ahead of the lifting of a state of emergency that had been declared after rioting over alleged election fraud. And of course, the Wall Street Journal worries that the unrest in Mongolia might hinder foreign investment in Mongolia’s mining sector.

Sarkozy’s Surveillance Proposals
Fistful of Euros (lucky them) reports on the French President’s proposals on Internet surveillance that failed to pass in France but now he is attempting to get them passed on a pan-Europe basis through a bureaucratic manuever in Brussels. And then Europe’s leaders wonder why Europe keeps on voting down treaties?

Return to Main

Cross-posted from The Global Sociology Blog. My post, my views.

Louise Arbour, outgoing UN High Commissioner on Human Rights, give an interview to Le Monde as she takes stock of the current state of human rights around the world.

Every time human rights are mentioned in conversation or even academic meetings, the objection always comes up that human rights are a Western creation that the United States and European countries are ramming down people’s throats all over the world. It is nonsense, of course (to everyone who knows the history of the drafting of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights), and it is reverse patronizing (as if only Western people could have come up with the idea of human rights).

But now, emerging countries, groups and powers such as China, Russia or the Muslim world claim a right to a different version of human rights (unsurprisingly, one that is much more restrictive, in terms of, well… rights). So how do we preserve the universality of these rights?

According to Louise Arbour, there are different lines of fracture in this debate. Developing countries, including China, tend to favor social and economic rights more than civil and political rights whereas the United States has done the opposite. This is a line of fracture inherited from the Cold War.

But the main line of fracture now has to do with the rise of religious groups, especially fundamentalist groups who declare these rights secular and therefore inapplicable to them. These groups claim that they should be adjusted.

(more…)