MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Food inflation in Latam eased during the first quarter, says FAO

Alan Bojanic, FAO regional representative for Latin America and the Caribbean

Food inflation in Latin America and the Caribbean decreased to 1.9% during the first quarter of this year according to a report from the regional office from the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, FAO, released Monday.

“Between November 2010 and January 2011, food inflation in the region reached 3.3% but then dropped to 1.9% in the first quarter of this year, below the average inflation which was 2.1% for the same period”, says FAO.

Nevertheless FAO warned that annual food inflation is still ahead of overall inflation in the last twelve months, 7.7% to 6.5%.

“The fall in food inflation is welcomed since it impacts mainly on the families with lower income which in some cases are forced to spend up to 60% of their income in food items. But prices remain high and we must continue to be alert”, said Alan Bojanic, FAO regional representative for Latin America and the Caribbean.

Bojanic added that high prices are particularly sensitive for the region since the main reason for food insecurity is difficulties to access to reasonably priced food items.

The report under the heading of “Food prices in Latin America and the Caribbean” is based on inflation indices from the different countries’ statistics offices.

To counter the rise and volatility of food prices, FAO is promoting a series of dialogues world wide to facilitate the exchange of experiences, good practices and identify collaboration opportunities to address the situation.

In this context FAO together with ECLAC the UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, and the Inter American Agriculture Cooperation Institute, IICA, is promoting next June top level dialogues in South America and Central America. The first of these dialogues is scheduled to take place in Santiago de Chile June 6 and 7 and will cover South America. The same month but on 15 and 16 a similar forum in El Salvador will discuss the Central America situation.

“These dialogues look into the future and enable countries to discuss measures that have been successful and which could be avoided”, said Bojanic.

Collecting information and experiences on rising food prices and volatility “we hope they can identify the best way to move ahead taking into account that in coming years food prices might be levelling off higher than those reached before the 2008 crisis” concluded the FAO representative.