Rising food prices are driving up school lunches. The Ledger (Lakeland, Fla.) reports wheat prices up 11 percent, dairy up 16 percent and juice prices up 22 percent. By the end of the year the Polk County Schools food service division could be $1 million in the red.
Read the story here:
http://www.theledger.com/article/20080418/NEWS/804180459/1039
See the front page story in the April 18, 2008, New York Times regarding the effects of rising food prices globally: “The food crisis is not only being felt among the poor but is also eroding the gains of the working and middle classes, sowing volatile levels of discontent and putting new pressures on fragile governments.”
Read the full story here (if the link doesn’t highlight, please cut and paste into your browser): http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/18/world/americas/18food.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin
Earlier this year, Florida Agriculture and Consumer Services Commissioner Charles H. Bronson awarded 12 grants totaling $25 million day by as part of the state’s “Farm to Fuel†initiative, to encourage the development of bio-fuel technology.
Read about the grants here:
http://domesticfuel.com/2008/01/22/florida-awards-biofuels%20grants/
April 14, 2008, President Bush directed the Secretary of Agriculture to draw down on the Bill Emerson Humanitarian Trust to meet emergency food aid needs abroad. With this action, an estimated $200 million in emergency food aid will be made available through the U.S. Agency for International Development. This additional food aid will address the impact of rising commodity prices on U.S. emergency food aid programs, and be used to meet unanticipated food aid needs in Africa and elsewhere.
Read the White House’s statement here:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2008/04/20080414-4.html
Haiti’s government collapsed April 12, 2008, after a week of food riots prompted the Haitian Senate to remove Prime Minister Jacques Edouard Alexis from office. Enraged by the soaring cost of staples such as rice and beans, Haitians had engaged in a week of rioting that cost at least five people their lives.Â
Read a story by the Reuters news service here:
http://www.reuters.com/article/homepageCrisis/idUSN12217781._CH_.2400
Florida Grower magazine has the following posted: “House Republican Conference Chairman Adam Putnam of Florida and Rep. Jim Costa, D-Calif., an Agriculture Committee member and Blue Dog, are preparing a bipartisan food safety bill that might have the potential to garner industry support as well as attract Democrats with agriculture interests away from other approaches in the works.”
Read the article in Florida Grower here:
Over the last 20 years the research that has been conducted at the University of Florida has contributed to the expansion of the Florida strawberry industry. The industry located primarily 35 miles around Plant City in the eastern portion of Hillsborough County, with sales in excess of $273,000,000. annually, has a total ecomonic impact to the county in excess of $500,000,000. The acerage has expanded to over 8,000 acres in the last 20 years, with over 80 percent of it planted with varieties developed at the University of Florida.Â
Prior to the release of UF cultivars the industry was totally dependent on varieties developed in California, that were not ideally suited to Florida’s growing conditions. The UF cultivars have allowed the industry to hit market windows in December and early January, a time frame that is highly desirable. The cultivars are also more resistant to fugal disease that are prevalent in Florida, allowing growers to better manage fungicide applications.
Because of the industries use of UF cultivars, Florida growers are no longer sending royalty monies to California to fund their research efforts, we are keeping that money here to do research that benifits the Florida Industryas well as the total economy of Florida. UF cultivars have not only benifited the Florida industry, today more than 50 countries around the world are using UF varieties, this global use of the cultivars has allowed the researchers to develop relationships across the globe, and that has truly benifited the industry as well as the standing of the University.
The efforts of the researchers have allowed for the continued growth of an industry that is known as “The winter strawberry capital of the world”. The industry also relies on extension personel who keep the growers informed of new technologies that become available, they also help us with implementaion with BMP’s. The combination of research and extension keeps Florida growers on the cutting edge of agricultural advancements. Without continued research Florida’s farmers and U.S. farmers will fall behind and we will see this country relying on others to feed it.Â
In the U.S. Congress, members of the House and Senate conference committee working on the Farm Bill have a lot of contentious issues to sort through if they have a chance of finding a compromise that the president can sign into law. Note: Congressman Adam Putnam (R-Fla.) is a member of the conference committee.Â
Read the CongressDaily article here:
The Wall Street Journal on April 1, 2008, reported that even as grocers tout sales and discounts, food costs are soaring. For instance, a dozen eggs cost 24 percent more than a year ago; whole milk is up 26 percent. In fact the price of every commodity “from corn to coffee†has risen dramatically. Last year saw the biggest leap in U.S. food prices in 17 years.
Read the story here:
The New York Times reported March 29, 2008, on how the scarcity of rice has led some nations to limit exports. Shortages of rice and other important foods have prompted protests and riots in half a dozen nations or more in recent months. Note: the United State imports more than 30 percent of the rice Americans consume.
Read the story here: