Creating an Opportunity for Fairer and More Sustainable Food and Agriculture Systems Worldwide

In 2008, agricultural commodity prices on world markets reached their highest levels in 30 years. In some cases, the nominal prices set new records. Some of the policy mistakes are seemingly not directly related to agriculture, but have had a profound impact on production choices, and on what kind of food is available, and to whom.

The authors believe that if governments aim to resolve the crisis by focusing on reducing prices back to pre-2005 levels, not only will they have missed a vital opportunity to strengthen food security and agriculture but they will also quickly find themselves back in crisis, as the underlying problems with global food and agriculture make themselves increasingly apparent.

Picture: Taking bananas to market, Mount Kenya region. Photo: Neil Palmer (CIAT). Original: WikimediaCommons. License: CC BY-SA 2.0