NightBlogger

Rising food prices are putting millions of people in East Africa at risk of severe hunger and destitution, the UK-based charity Oxfam has warned. Droughts, war and poverty have put an estimated nine to 13 million people in the region in urgent need of humanitarian assistance, it says. The situation has been made worse by rising food prices, with wheat and rice particularly expensive. A BBC correspondent says some people have started to eat animal feed. Many people in the remote north-eastern Afar region raise animals for a living but many camels have died and the goats are starting to succumb to hunger too. More

Photo azrainman
The mass diversion of the North American grain harvest into ethanol plants for fuel is reaching its political and moral limits. “The world food situation is very serious: we have seen riots in Egypt, Cameroon, Haiti and Burkina Faso,” said Mr Diouf. “There is a risk that this unrest will spread in countries where 50pc to 60pc of income goes to food.”

Read more