Something to ponder as you sit down to Sunday dinner amid the ruins of the UN food crisis summit

From The Independent today:

Spam flies off the shelves of American supermarkets; looted shops burn in Port-au-Prince, Haiti; and the food crisis elbows climate change off the UN's agenda at a summit that draws more heads of state and media than any in recent memory – yet reaches no useful conclusions.

The food crisis has gripped the whole world in the past year, from the wealthiest countries to the poorest: from Japan, where beef has vanished off school menus in favour of less costly chicken or pork, and the US, where sales of Spam have shot up 10 per cent, to the poorest nations, where 70 or 80 per cent of people's income goes on food (in the UK the figure is 10 per cent).

Thirty-seven countries are confronted by a crisis in food costs, according to the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), while riots have broken out in two dozen.

Haiti used to grow its own rice, and its farmers were protected by high tariff barriers. But as a condition for an International Monetary Fund loan in 1986, it was compelled to slash tariffs, and within two years the local markets had been flooded by heavily subsidised American rice. Local farmers, unable to compete, went out of business. The process was repeated in 1994. Globalised Haiti, no longer able to feed itself, was at the mercy of the world food prices.

Meanwhile, the price of food has become a pawn in the hands of financial speculators. Speculative trading in agricultural commodities has grown by more than 1,000 per cent in the past four years, to more than $150bn (£76bn). With the price of oil – the key ingredient in fertilisers and agrochemicals – surging unstoppably, food prices are expected to remain at historic highs for the next decade.

A sane world would at this point reverse course and do some of the worthy things that UN summits are so good at talking about – helping some of the 96 per cent of African farms dependent on rainfall to build irrigation systems, for example.

But the business-driven priority, as endorsed by the FAO summit, is to gouge open the world's economies even faster, via a speedy conclusion of the Doha round of trade liberalisation. That is likely to make it even harder for the poor to feed themselves.

Further article links here.

America goes down the rabbit hole once more

It is never easy to decide if the United States of America has absolutely no grasp of the ironic or it simply knows the way to Alice's wonderland.

With the US having little credibility left concerning its own human rights record, yesterday News.com.au reported:

THE US has decided to limit further its involvement with the UN Human Rights Council due to its "pathetic" record.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice "has taken the decision that we will engage the Human Rights Council really only when we believe that there are matters of deep national interest before the council, and we feel compelled", said State Department spokesman Sean McCormack.
"Our scepticism regarding the function of the council on human rights in terms of fulfilling its mandate and its mission is well-known. It has a rather pathetic record in that regard,'' he said.

At the same time Human Rights Watch comments on America's 2.3 million people behind bars:

"The new incarceration figures confirm the United States as the world's leading jailer,'' said David Fahti, HRW's US program director.
"Americans should ask why the US locks up so many more people than do Canada, Britain, and other democracies,'' he said.
The new figures show a sharp racial imbalance in the US prison population, with blacks outnumbering whites by six to one.
Nearly 11 per cent of black men aged 30-34 were in prison, according to Justice Department figures.
HRW said blacks in the US were12 times more likely to be sent to jail for drug-related crimes than whites, even though drug use among the two races was about the same.

Bill Henson is owed an apology

At Live News yesterday Tim Brunero asked:

Will Miranda Devine apologise to Bill Henson?

After the furore created by journalist Miranda Devine and Braveheart's Hetty Johnson, it would appear that an apology is in order to artist, Bill Henson. Though I imagine that none of us will live long enough to see this happen.

Bill Henson's profile from the art gallery also caught up in these failed allegations of wrongdoing.

Synchronous views of Obama

With the US Republicans now busy searching for that cache of Kryptonite, this flight of fancy tickled my rather juvenile sense of humour this week.

The allusion to Superman is something Senator Obama also appears to fancy himself.

Images from Us versus Them and Democracy in Action.

Helicopter? Which helicopter? Whose helicopter?

Grafton's Daily Examiner reports that Mr Billabong, Gordon (aka Greasy) Merchant, is believed to be involved in a wrangle with Clarence Valley Council over the use of his helicopter.

A development application (DA) has been made by Yamba surveyors Harrison Shepherd with Clarence Valley Council requesting its client Kahuna Pty Ltd be allowed to continue making helicopterflights in the Yamba area.

A number of local residents have made complaints to Clarence Valley Council about the helicopter's noise

The Examiner reports that the application states that only two flights have been made so far this year.

Some residents dispute this claim.

NSW Most Unwanted: Frank Sartor

Most Unwanted

Unwanted and dangerous NSW Labor Minister for Planning, Hon. Frank Ernest Sartor, MP.
Suffers from a Napoleonic complex and sometimes tries to pass himself off as a reincarnation of the late and unlamented Liberal Premier Robert Askin.
Has committed crimes against the environment, urban areas and regional communities.
Currently rampaging through the NSW Environmental Planning and Assessment Act wielding a development industry scalpel.
Known to go berserk when faced with a democratic process and exhibits an irrational rage towards local government.
Do not approach. May be rabid. Call dog catcher if sighted.

National Goanna Pulling Championships, Wooli Sunday 8 June 2008

This Sunday, Wooli on the NSW North Coast will be holding the National Goanna Pulling Championships at the Wooli Sports Ground.
This annual event kicks off at 9am through to 4pm. Entry is free.
Winner in the heavyweight division takes home a cash prize of $500.
Day also includes kids fun events, foot races, market stalls, beer garden and mobile farm nursery.

This hilarious and intensely competitive sport is something like a tug-o-war match between two competitors pulling from a strap attached around their necks. The belly-down position up on two legs and the backward-scuttle motion required to gain ground is reminiscent of a goanna's gait.

Contact Details:
Australian National Goanna Pulling Competition
Wooli Sports Ground
Wooli, NSW 2462
Telephone: 02 - 6649 7540

Totally underwhelmed by the latest Bright Idea, Prime Minister

Everyone's noticing. It's almost as though the Prime Minister can't stand one moment of media time passing without an announcement of one of his Bright Ideas.
Yesterday it was teh vision for South-East Asia.
Something to rival the European Union and presumably the UN (after all our Kev doesn't think small).
To be smooched into place by veteran diplomat Richard Wilcox in time for, you guessed it, 2020.
Anti-terrorism, defence, free trade, regional politics, energy and resource security - all would be resolved through harmonious cooperation.
Yeah, Rudd wants it all and he wants America in the mix. I'm sure adding an imperial barracuda like the US would seal everyone's fate and possibly destroy the region.
Oi, Kev! Hold the horses, mate. Did you even run any of this by the Australian electorate in the lead up to last November's federal election?
Any mention you might have had slipped in during a workshop at the unrepresentative, undemocratic and elitist Australia 2020 summit earlier this year doesn't count.
Fer gawd's sake! Will the Deputy PM gather a few sane Labor souls and have them bundle Rudd into a quiet, dark room for a week until his hyperactive imagination subsides.
At the very least - don't let him on Sunday's flight to Japan unless he is sufficiently medicated.

US 08 and the media: change we can believe in?

It seems that some American online media and I suspect the Obama for America campaign team have a desire to manipulate impressions of the obvious crowd-drawing strength of the Democratic candidate for the 2008 US presidential election.
It is all image, image, image.

The Washington Post online edition yesterday ran what looks suspiciously like an undeclared montage or digital enhancement.
Although this is not the first manipulated image of the senator, it is perhaps the most clumsy.
It also highlights how easily media slips into grey areas surrounding ethics and partisanship.

There is a little Mugabe in every world leader

No-one should wonder at an UN conference on world food security which allows the attendance of a despot like Robert Mugabe who has reduced his own country to abject poverty and food shortages.
The fact that neither the UN or any other international organisation have found an answer to chronic food shortages or cyclical famine lies in the nature of modern societies and their leaders.
Each and every one is willing to make symbolic and one-off gestures to assist the world's poor and starving, but none are willing to abandon their single-minded pursuit of political power and economic dominance.
Like any despot they all only look to their own personal interests and that of their immediate entourage and ignore all else.
Like Mugabe they each point a finger of blame when they should be remedying their own failings.
So when Ban Ki-Moon calls for a 50% increase in world food production to help feed the 100 million food poor, you know it will only happen if major food exporting nations are able to reap substantial profits.
That many Western nations would prefer to write a cheque like Great Britain, rather than seriously look at how to increase the agricultural self-reliance of the poorest nations and reduce the world's reliance on energy intensive farming and the associated costs of water, fuel, fertilisers and copyrighted seed.

The shortsighted view relying on successive foreign aid fixes has resulted in above world map found at BBC News yesterday.

Link to International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), a specialized agency of the United Nations, website and debate on who pays the price.