Pandemic could lead to food inflation: UN

SINGAPORE:LOCKDOWNS and panic food buying due to the coronavirus pandemic could ignite world food inflation even though there are ample supplies of staple grains and oilseeds in key exporting nations, a senior economist at the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) said.

The world’s richest nations poured unprecedented aid into the global economy as coronavirus cases ballooned across Europe and the US.

With over 270,000 infections and more than 11,000 deaths, the epidemic has stunned the world and drawn comparisons with periods such as World War 2 and the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic.

“All you need is panic buying from big importers such as millers or governments to create a crisis,” said Abdolreza Abbassian, chief economist at the FAO.

“It is not a supply issue, but it is a behavioural change over food security,” he told Reuters. “What if bulk buyers think they can’t get wheat or rice shipments in May or June? That is what could lead to a global food supply crisis.”

Consumers across the world from Singapore to the US have queued at super markets in recent weeks to stock up on items ranging from rice and hand sanitisers to toilet paper.

Restrictions imposed by some European Union countries at their borders with other member states in response to the pandemic are also disrupting food supplies, representatives of the industry and farmers said.

However, global wheat stocks at the end of the crop marketing year in June are projected to rise to 287.14 million tonnes - up from 277.57 million tonnes a year ago, according to estimates from the US department of agriculture (USDA).

Global rice stocks are projected at 182.3 million tonnes as compared with 175.3 million tonnes a year ago.