Global Food Price Inflation

 The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) says global food prices rose 28% in 2021.

"The last time food prices were this high was in 2011, when policymakers were actually warning about a global food crisis," says Dr Abdul Abiad of the Asian Development Bank (ADB).

Even in a wealthy nation like Singapore, it means that the number of families seeking help has increased.

"What we have seen when we make the door-to-door deliveries is that young families with both husband and wife working a part-time job or in the gig economy - these were the families that got impacted when Covid hit and all the part-time work dried up," says Nichol Ng, co-founder of Food Bank Singapore.

It is not just the poorest 10% of the population who now need help, she says: "It has slowly crept to maybe 20% of the population including middle-income families that might not even know where to get help in the first place."

Global food prices are expected to remain high this year and the FAO's David Dawe says this is of concern for Asian governments because price hikes have not yet worked their way through the system.

"If global prices continue to rise, there will be an impact, especially for lower income families who spend bigger proportion of their income on food."

How the high cost of living is hitting Singapore's poor - BBC News