World food prices that surged 30 per cent in the first two months of the year threaten to push millions of Asians into extreme poverty and cut economic growth, the Asian Development Bank said Tuesday.

The surging prices translated into domestic food inflation of 10 per cent on average in many Asian economies, which could drive 64 million people into poverty, the bank said in a report, adding that it will also erode the living standards of families already living in poverty.
Food prices have been driven higher by surging oil prices, production shortfalls due to bad weather and export restrictions by several food producing countries.
If higher food and oil prices persist for the rest of the year, they could shave as much as 1.5 percentage points from economic growth in developing Asian countries, the report said.
Some countries will be hit harder than others. Singapore is highly vulnerable to inflation because the tiny city-state must import all its food. On the other hand, South Korea, where food accounts for a relatively small part of the consumer price index, will get off lightly.
The rapid increases in the cost of food are a serious setback for the region that has rebounded rapidly from the global economic crisis.
Declining grain stocks, higher demand from Asian countries with big populations that are growing wealthier and a dwindling amount of agricultural land will continue to keep food prices high in the short term.
So will competition for food grains from biofuel production and stagnant or declining crop yields. Drought in China’s major wheat-producing belt and flooding in rice-producing regions of Asia have reduced supplies of those crops.
ADB chief economist Changyong Rhee says food export bans should be avoided and greater investments made in agriculture.
“Left unchecked, the food crisis will badly undermine recent gains in poverty reduction made in Asia,” he said.
Poor families in Asia are hit much harder by food price inflation because they spend as much as 60 percent of their income on food, a much higher proportion than in developed countries. Asia’s developing countries are home to two-thirds of the world’s poor, about 600 million people, who live on $1.25 a day or less.
In contrast, people in the US and other developing countries spend 10 percent or less of their income on food, so the impact on rising food prices on their wallets isn’t as big. And a lot of the food sold in wealthy countries is processed, so manufacturing costs account for a bigger share of the final price.
The ADB is a development lender whose mission is to alleviate poverty through loans, grants and assistance projects.
Global food prices jumped 34.2 per cent in February over a year ago following a 28.4 percent rise in January, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization’s (FAO) benchmark index. Surging cereal, edible oil and meat prices were behind the increases.
The FAO warned that 29 countries in Africa, Asia, Middle East and Latin America and the Caribbean would need food assistance. Afghanistan and Pakistan are among those that will face severe food shortages in part due to factors such as social unrest and ethnic conflicts. Cambodia and Laos also face unfavorable prospects for crops due to delayed and erratic rains.

MULTAN,April 3rd:The President Mango Growers Association Pakistan, Syed Zahid Hussain Gardezi has said that Government should introduce long-term and sustainable agricultural policy for the next decade to compensate the growers by controlling the prices in the country to escape from the food autarky.New Policy should envisage the boosting up of production, per acre yield by adopting modern technology. In a Press statement issued here on Sunday Syed Zahid Hussain Gardezi said that since Pakistan is an agricultural country and its economy entirely depend upon the agriculture and agro-based industry.Our Policy makers should recommend incentives for the growers like provision of farm inputs on concessional or reasonable rate,tax-free farm implements, duty fre export of agricultural machinery. He said that on one hand the farmers are distressed at the high cost of inputs, water scarcity, load shedding and lack of applied research in agriculture with an added insult to their efforts in shape of marketing distortions and callous role of middleman while on the other hand it has been ceremonial fixing of support price of essential food commodities. It is a stark reality that large highly impoverished segment of our population find it extremely difficult to feed themselves at the cost of food available and governments have to resort to gimmicks of “Sasti Roti “ or various Income support programs. He said that the higher cost of produce is mainly due to lower production averages and other sundry avoidable constraints, as such the farmers find agriculture a deficit trade and many have abandoned their ancestral livelihood while the new generation of farmers are least fascinated in this trade. He said that there has been no realistic agriculture policy and there are flaws in priorities set by the rulers for this sector which is being attended on adhoc basis. It has become a mandatory policy requirement of our governments to beg aid and expertise from developed countries to help us produced more wheat or grow quality mangoes in a country which is wholly an agrarian economy, while we have never taken initiatives to explore our own acumen or given priority to find out reasons why even in good mango seasons growers make losses. He said it is very unfortunate that to make living comfortable for elite class of our society we have built palatial housing schemes even on agriculture lands but have willfully ignored technology transfer to small and medium farmers and agriculture research in comparison to non productive extravaganza and Hi Fi living standards for the affordable.Zahid Gardezi said that the impending disaster of drought like situation has yet not unnerved our hierarchy as we see no headway towards establishment of large water reservoirs. He said that country’s security is directly related with its prosperity which is more required in the rural sector of Pakistan and it is now crucially important to take stock of the situation apart from the acknowledged benefits of a democratic system in the Country. There is a need to help growers and farmers rise, have respectable livings and also be able to feed the unaffordable and become major players in country’s economy. It is time to make nation stand on its own feet which can only happen when the common man on the streets and villages is not addicted to monetary grants but provided equal opportunities across the board. He said creating Model Farms of the affluent is gross disservice to agriculture and has delivered negligible benefit to the agriculture sector except gratifying projects needs.Zahid Gardezi said policy have never ascertained that agriculture sector in Pakistan is characterized by strong inequality in the distribution of assets. About 2 percent of the households control more than 45 percent of the land area.Syed Zahid Hussain Gardezi said that Big and influential farmers have also captured the benefits of agricultural growth and incentives. Agencies and departments have mostly focused affluent model farms to vindicate progress. He said that Agriculture finances and services should be transparently stretched for the large majority of Small and Medium farmers and islands of excellence in shape of “Clusters” should be promoted to vindicate the continued neglect. He said Mango Growers Association is honestly committed and highlighting the perils and delight of our world class mangoes since late eighties during the out gone century and we are glad our government have only realized this phenomena when appreciated by Hillary Clinton, late Mr. Holbrooke, David Miliband and all others who visited the Mango City of Pakistan – Multan and interacted with us on various forums.

Pakistan's government has pushed food prices too high for its impoverished population and malnutrition is rising despite crop recovery after dire floods, a UN relief official said.
Food crops especially wheat in the southern plains hit by last year's floods were recovering fast with the prospect of decent yields in coming weeks, said World Food Programme (WFP) director in Pakistan, Wolfgang Herbinger.
"The crop outlook is not bad but the food security situation remains difficult because prices remain so high," he told journalists on the sidelines of humanitarian meetings in Geneva.
"The government is the biggest buyer of wheat in Pakistan, they are setting the farm gate price and they dominate the market," Herbinger said.
"That's why the wheat price in Pakistan didn't adjust when, for example, in 2009 and early 2010 the wheat price had gone back a lot, it stayed high to the detriment of local consumers."
People paid double the price for wheat compared to three years ago and the food security situation has "changed dramatically," the WFP official added.
Malnutrition levels in the southern province of Sindh have reached 21 to 23 percent, according to the agency.
"That is well above African standards. The emergency standard is 15 percent," the WFP official stated.
A recent survey found that in some flood-hit areas 70 percent of people were taking out loans to pay for food.
"You may have the country full with food but people are too poor to buy it," he said.
The WFP was "struggling a bit" to get the message across, he said. "We are working a lot with the ministry of agriculture to explain to the minister that it is not enough to have enough production in the country if people can't afford it."
"Maybe for political reasons he doesn't always understand it, that it's one thing to be nice to the farmers but if your consumers can't afford it then it's... So there's something wrong with agricultural policy," Herbinger added.
Massive floods caused by monsoon rains in July and August 2010 killed thousands, destroyed 1.7 million homes and damaged 5.4 million acres of arable land, experts have said.

At a time when financing for fresh wheat crop procurement is required urgently, some Rs 195.757 billion have been found tied up in the form of wheat stock in the country that is estimated at 6.757 million tonnes lying with the provinces and Pakistan Agriculture Storage and Supply Corporation (PASSCO), official sources informed.

The federal and provincial government are trying to export at least 2-3 million tonnes of wheat to arrange some portion of financing for public sector procurement of wheat. Sources said that Punjab province has Rs 132.882 billion wheat stock, Sindh Rs 20.598 billion, and Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa Rs 4.571 billion stocks. Balochistan and PASSCO have Rs 1.852 billion and Rs 35.846 billion stocks respectively. The total wheat stock with the Punjab province is 4.622 million tonnes, Sindh 0.772 million tonnes, provinces, 0.159 million tonnes and Balochistan 0.069 million tonnes. The total wheat stock with PASSCO is 1.185 million tonnes.

The Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) was informed that 2.608 million tonnes wheat stock is available for export and provinces have signed agreements with various parties in for early disposal for extra stocks for creating fiscal space for procurement of new crop and creating space for storage. The meeting was informed that Punjab province has singed agreement for lifting of 1100,000 million tonnes and Sindh for 300,000 tonnes.

The ECC of the Cabinet in its last meeting had approved guarantee worth Rs 164.978 billion for public sector to procure 6.57 million tonnes wheat from the wheat crop 2011. Federal government will provide payment guarantee to provinces and PASSCO on financing they would obtain from banking sector.

The ECC also endorsed the public sector wheat procurement target of 6.57 million tonnes and assigned procurement targets i.e. Punjab to procure 3.5 million tonnes, PASSCO to procure 1.3 million tonnes, Sindh 1.3 million tonnes, Khyber Pukhtunkhwa 0.4 million tonnes and Balochistan to procure 0.07 million of wheat from farmers on minimum guaranteed price of 950 per 40 kilogram. ECC also decided that Punjab and PASSCO would maintain one million tonnes Wheat Strategic Reserves as propionate of their procurement. ECC also allowed the provinces that they could maintain further wheat strategic reserves according to their capacity and needs.

It was informed to the ECC that Punjab already possesses 2.66 million of wheat and these stocks to be sold so as to create a space for fresh stock of wheat at public storage facilities. The provinces also allowed exporting wheat exports according to their wheat stock availability.

The Committee constituted for wheat issues in the chairmanship of Deputy Chairman Planning Commission also presented it’s report to the ECC and recommended that wheat export should continue and government should not impose any ban on export of wheat. A cut-off date should also be announced so as the wheat exporters could obtain and meet their export targets.

MULTAN (March 18, 2011) : Chairman of Pakistan Cotton Ginners Association (PCGA), Masood A Majeed has said that shortfall of cotton arrival was 8.74 percent. He said total 1,15,74,917 bales of cotton were received during this season. It was 11,09,026 bales less than last year showing a decline of 8.74 percent in the production due to flood, diseases , pest attacks.and some other causes. While 72,489 bales were received during last fortnight from March 1st to to March 15, 2011. He said that total 45 ginning factories are operational in Sindh and Punjab. Recent floods had badly hit the cotton crop in the districts of Muzaffargarh, Layyah, Rajanpur, Rahimyarkhan Multan and Dera Ghazi Khan. They said that 37.77 percent cotton was destroyed in Muzaffargarh, 56.43 percent in Rajanpur, 7.14 percent in Dera Ghazi Khan, 12.84 in Jhang, 19.12 percent in Hyderabad and 23.30 percent in Ghotki. Cotton production in the country has declined by 8.74 percent as the arrivals recorded at the gunneries as on March 15th, 2011 stood at 1,15,74,917 bales, showing a decrease of 8.74 percent from 1,26,83,943 bales received in the corresponding period of last year.
The report reveals an increase of 26.04 percent in cotton in Lodhran district, 126.45. percent increase in Mianwali district, and 9.46 percent increase in Balochistan. The unsold stock is 2,97,656 bales which is less than last year, when unsold stock was 3,23,143 Chairman of Pakistan Cotton Ginners Association (PCGA), Masood A Majeed briefed reporters about the fortnightly report.
Punjab contributed 77,84,573 bales, last year it contributed 84,54,962 bales showing a decline of 7.93 percent, Similarly Sindh contributed 37,90,344 bales against the last year production of 42,28,981 bales showing a decrease of 10.37 percent and Balochistan 24,118 bales to take the total to 1,13,81,291 bales.
District-wise production data showed that Multan contributed 4,32,935 bales, Lodhran 2,52,716 bales, Khanewal 7,52, 649 bales, Muzaffargarh 2,40,008 bales, Dera Ghazi Khan 3,04,927 bales, Rajanpur 2,02,270 bales, Layyah 1,79,554 bales, Vehari 7,70,454 bales, Sahiwal 5,40,010 bales, Pakpattan 2,68,377 bales, Okara 52,600 bales, Kasur 8,200 bales, Toba Tek Singh 2,77,746 bales, Faisalabad 1,16,200 bales, Jhang 1,57,511 bales, Mianwali 1,73,714 bales, Bhakkar 94,226 bales, Sargodha 41,052, Rahim Yar Khan 10,51,885 bales, Bahawalpur 8,85,855 bales, and Bahawalnagar 9,81,684 bales.
Sindh's district-wise production figures were: Hyderabad 3,62,675 bales, Mirpurkhas 4,06,961 bales, Sanghar 15,97,452 bales, Nawabshah 3,48,568 bales, Naushero Feroze 1,94,458 bales, Khairpur 2,08,542 bales, Ghotki 2,20,323 bales, Sukkur 3,08,770 bales, and Dadu 1,18,877 bales.
Balochistan added 24,118 bales to the total. The arrivals figures recorded so far are the lowest Pakistan ever had. PCGA claimed that 2 million bales were destroyed in recent floods in Punjab and Sindh. Policy-makers may hope that bumper cotton crop will help the government make deficiency in other areas, taking the annual growth rates to over 7 percent.The chairman PCGA reiterated demand to the government to announce relief and bail out package for cotton ginning factories of flood-hit areas and survey of such area should be completed shortly. The report said that the ginners pressed 1,15,62,010 bales. Only 5,25,177 bales were exported by commercial exporters (who mostly purchased from Sindh), and merely 80,228 bales were purchased from Punjab. The textile industry purchased 1,07,52,084 bales and 2,97,656 bales were available with ginners as unsold stock.