Food Prices have become one of the most important topics in India over the last 2 years.A Deficient Monsoon season in 2009 was the primary cause of a sharp rise in Food Prices leading to Food Insecurity for a majority of the India.A recent study found that more than half of the Indians still live in poverty making Food Prices perhaps the most important issue for them.With a vast majority of Indians living on wages below $2/day,increasing food prices can mean hungry stomachs to even sometime starvation.Not that starvation is new to the Indian state with parts of Eastern India particularly Orissa infamous for starvation deaths.Food inflation in India has continued to rage even in 2010 with prices increasing by a whopping 17-18%.What has led to this sharp rise in food prices which has made the lives of poor Indians even more miserable.The causes are both local and external and have been listed down
India’s benchmark measure of food inflation held near an 11-year high, highlighting the challenge policy makers face in curbing inflation without hurting a nascent economic recovery.An index of food articles compiled by the commerce ministry increased 18.22 percent in the week ended Dec. 26 from a year earlier, following a 19.83 percent gain in the previous week. Food-price inflation accelerated to 19.95 percent in the week to Dec. 5, the fastest pace since Dec. 1998.Price gains eased in the week to Dec. 26 from the previous week as costs of some food items softened. Prices of vegetables gained 30.97 percent in the week, compared with 46.7 percent rise in the prior period, while fruits rose 7.87 percent, less than 10.35 percent, today’s report showed. Milk prices increased 12.6 percent from 13.6 percent.
Summary
Rising Food Prices is a Burning Topic for India despite a lack of attention given to it by mainstream media outlets.There has been a massive amount of food insecurity amongst ordinary Indians who are finding it difficult to meet their basic nutritional requirement.The current government has not done enough to alleviate this problem despite increasing revenues derived from a rapidly growing economy.The proposed Food Security Bill will be an important Law to solve this food crisis if is not diluted by vested interests.