As skyrocketing crop prices fuel fears about soaring food costs and hunger around the globe, rice, one of the world’s most consumed staples, is bucking the trend and warding off a broader food crisis at least for now.
Rice is the predominant source of nourishment each day for more than 3 billion people, and yet it hasn’t rallied anything like other agricultural commodities from corn to soy and meat. While prices are above levels a year earlier, they’ve declined in recent months in some of the top exporters including Vietnam, Thailand and India on improved supplies from new harvests.
One reason for the diverging trend is that rice is grown mainly for human consumption, whereas the surge in crop prices has been driven by booming demand for livestock feed. China’s insatiable appetite for hog feed has combined with poor crop weather to drain world grain and oilseed supplies, sending corn and soybeans to the highest level in more than eight years.
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