Billions of dollars are being made by investors in a speculative "food bubble" that's created record food prices, starving millions and destabilising countries, experts now conclude. Wall Street investment firms and banks, along with their kin in London and Europe, were responsible for the technology dot-com bubble, the stock market bubble, and the recent U.S. and UK housing bubbles. They extracted enormous profits and their bonuses before the inevitable collapse of...

The class bias in government policy is clear in the decision to release a small amount of foodgrain in the open market to tackle inflation. MOST people would agree that there is a strong element of speculation underlying the current inflation and that forward trading contributes to it. Yet the government, though it has banned forward trading in certain commodities under public pressure, is curiously reluctant to see this point....

NREGA has always been touted as the UPAs flagship scheme but there have been a number of instances when the scheme has been misused by those who are dispensing funds.   IAS officers Sukhveer Singh and Chandrashekar Borkar both posted in Seedhi district in Madhya Pradesh, between 2006 and 2007, were charged with misappropriating nine crore rupees during this tenure. Funds meant for NREGA, a scheme that ensures hundred days of work...

Higher food prices pose a major threat to the global economy and social stability but policymakers must not over-regulate commodity markets, a senior World Bank official said on Thursday. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, managing director at the Washington-based bank, said rising food prices are squeezing the poor and contributing to social instability. "Higher food prices and volatility are one of the biggest threats to the global economic recovery and social stability. You saw...

The present situation is different from that of 2007-2008, although recent climatic events may significantly reduce agricultural production next season. Must history always repeat itself? We are indeed on the verge of what could turn out to be another major food crisis. The FAO Food Price Index at the end of 2010 returned to its highest level. Drought in Russia and the export restrictions adopted by the government, together with...