We all have gone to the grocery store and found that our food keeps costing us more and more of our hard earned cash.
We bitch about the cost of gas…but at least it comes down….maybe not to as low as it was a month ago but it does fluctuate…food on the other hand does not.
Will we ever get a break?
The prediction is….not on your life. (Keep in mind that this will be a global problem just not a solely Main Street problem)
The new analysis shows that global warming could cause food price inflation to increase by between 0.9 and 3.2 percentage points per year by 2035. The same warming will cause a smaller rise in overall inflation (between 0.3 and 1.2 percentage points), so a greater proportion of household income would need to be spent on buying food.
This effect will be felt worldwide, by high and low-income countries alike, but nowhere more so than in the global south. As with various other consequences of climate change, Africa will be worst affected despite contributing little to its causes.
…
The first is that the same climate change effects that are causing the inflation are already making food harder to get hold of. For instance, higher temperatures can cause long-established and predictable farming seasons to shift and so may hinder crop production.
Other consequences can include more pest and disease outbreaks that deplete livestock and food reserves, and heat stress to already-poor roads which makes it harder to access rural communities.
All of these factors push prices higher and reduce the purchasing power of affected households. The drivers of food inflation are already worsening food insecurity.
Then there is the food that you go to the grocery for….like fruits and veggies….they could be poisoning you.
The latest edition of an annual consumer’s guide published Wednesday reveals that almost three-fourths of non-organic fruits and vegetables sampled contained traces of toxic pesticides while the “dirty dozen”—including strawberries and spinach—tested at levels closer to 95%.
Scientists with the Environmental Working Group (EWG) document in their new report, “2024 Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides In Produce,” that four out of five of the most frequently detected pesticides found on the twelve most-contaminated produce items were fungicides that could have serious health impacts.
“There’s data to suggest that these fungicides can disrupt the hormone function in our body,” EWG senior scientist Alexa Friedman told Common Dreams, adding that the chemicals had “been linked to things like worse health outcomes” and “impacts on the male reproductive system.”
https://www.commondreams.org/news/ewg-2024-dirty-dozen-pesticides
Another reason I try to grow as much of my fruit and veggies as possible…..although I am getting older and gardening is getting harder.
Just thought I would let you know what is on the food horizon.
I Read, I Write, You Know
“lego ergo scribo”
In Saner Thought 
The weekly price increases on groceries in the supermarkets here are becoming laughable. It’s as if they walk around every Sunday night randomly deciding to add 10% to everything. And they are STILL blaming the war in Ukraine for it, despite staggering profits for all 6 big supermarkets being posted. The CEO of the biggest supermarket received a £4.9 million BONUS on top of his monumental salary last year. That’s what we are paying for!
Best wishes, Pete.
Same here….now they are saying price of eggs will increase because of bird flu….it never stops. chuq
Price of eggs here went from about $0,99/doz up to about $5/doz, then dropped down to about $1.50, then went up again to about $4, now it’s down to $1.50 again… And no one has been able to explain why to my satisfaction.
As a former farmer myself I keep an eye on what’s going on in the world of agriculture and it frankly terrifies me. More and more farmland is becoming concentrated in the hands of fewer and fewer people. The days of the “family farm” are long gone, despite the fact that a lot of these huge industrial ag operations claim they are still “family farms”. They aren’t. Not even close. They’re large, multi-million dollar corporations. The ownership may still reside, in part, with some of the original family members but that’s about it.
Most of the farmland in the US doesn’t grow actual food crops any longer, they grow industrial raw materials like corn and soybeans that ultimately go into things like bio-fuels and, of course, heavily processed junk food that is essentially nutrition free and only adds salt and fat to our diets. And those crops are drenched with herbicides, pesticides and fertilizers that not only get incorporated into the food itself but run off into the water contaminating our drinking water.
Just a single mega farm here in Wisconsin, one of those dairy operations that milks thousands of cows, produces as much raw sewage as a small city. One farm near here produces as much raw sewage as the entire city of Fond du Lac with a population of about 30,000 people.
These days it’s all about corporate profits. The whole “wholesome family farm” nonsense is just that, nonsense and propaganda. Except for a handful of small speciality farmers and a few organic farms, the family farm vanished long ago.
Small farms down here are disappearing as well….and food prices continue the upward swing….I try to grow as mush as possible….sadly the climate is not cooperating this year (again)….we had a storm move through that took out 3/4 of my tomato plants…..it is getting frustrating….and nurseries are doing the same thing with their gardening section….price increases swelling their profits. chuq
There is no escaping the pesticide future…
I will have more to say on that front very soon. chuq
I hope to hell so– it is a very important topic—