Catherine Sasman
15 April 2008
Windhoek — Namibia, like the rest of the world, is buckling under sharp food price increases, New Era reports.
"It is terrible, something must be done about the increase in food prices," said 61-year-old pensioner, Evelene Mafanga, after she has done her shopping and walks to look for a taxi back home.
She holds out her hand to show the change she has left after buying a loaf of brown bread - N$3.10.
"This is all I have left. As a pensioner I cannot cope without falling into debt and when the pension monies come in at the end of the month, everything goes out to service the debt."
Most pensioners, she said, are caught in this vicious financial circle and the staggering increase on food prices, particularly basic foodstuffs, has dunked this group even more into debt and poverty.
While one of her children helps her to pay her rent, she lives alone and struggles alone to keep her head above water, she says.
Her monthly shopping trolley has shrunk to five kilogrammes mealie-meal, five kilogrammes bread flour, cooking oil, a packet of Rooibos tea, two kilogrammes of brown sugar and meat consisting of some sausages, some beef, but mostly offal.
"I just cannot get that piece of chicken usually reserved for Sundays anymore," she said.
"See what I have bought for lunch," said Margareth Muyunda (53), opening her yellow plastic shopping bag to illustrate her point.
"I can only afford two brötchens (rolls). The price of food is just too high. We cannot afford commodities like macaroni or cooking oil anymore. One now has to buy butter instead."
Muyunda is a single mother of five children - three are still attending school and the two older ones are at tertiary institutions, so there is no supplementary salary to help out.
"I don't know where all these prices are going to end up," she said, adding that as a secretary at the High Court, she only takes home N$1000 per month.
"Inflation is so high, we cannot keep up," said another frustrated shopper, Luisa Bock. "Imagine what unemployed people must survive on. I cannot even say that I am surviving. I think it is so unfair; those with money get more, while those with none suffer more due to the increase of food prices."
If only the salaries can increase concomitantly, said Manfred Swartz, people may have a fighting chance to survive the new price hikes.
"It is not only the price of food that has increased; it is fuel, rent, inflation. The only thing that has not increased this year is our salary."
Waiting for customers, 31-year-old taxi driver Petrus Ashipala said his daily income has also shrunk considerably, but the sector is finding it difficult to increase their rates.
Taxi fares went up from N$6.50 to N$7 this year, the only increase for the year so far, but fuel prices have soared beyond all expectations.
"This means that I only take home something between N$180 and N$220 per day. Previously, I would at least take home between N$250 and N$300 per day," said Ashipala.
Last week, the Bank of Namibia (BoN) announced an annual increase in food prices of up to 15.6 percent in February this year, with food such as milk, cheese, eggs, oils and fats, vegetables and potatoes having gone up by 20 percent.
The reason for this increase - which is experienced on a worldwide scale - is said to be due to a confluence of three factors, said the Bank: the switch to planting crops for bio-fuel consumption, adverse climatic conditions and an increasing demand for protein in fast-growing economies such as China and India. In neighbouring South Africa - Namibia's main food supplier - an added element of a crippling electricity shortage has to be factored in to understand the rise in food prices in the region.
A Growing Global Crisis
According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), food prices globally have increased by 48 percent since the end of 2006. The price of maize has doubled; world wheat prices have gone up by 70 percent; corn increased by 80 percent; and the price of rice, which is a staple food to thousands of millions, has increased by 75 percent.
According to the Global Crop Diversity Trust, maize is the preferred staple food to more than 1.2 billion people in Africa and Latin America. Cassava provides one-third of the calorific requirements in sub-Sahara, and is the staple food to as many as 200 million poor people.
The IMF and the World Bank have warned that the soaring food prices could adversely affect as many as 100 million people. These organisations have called on rich nations to contribute at least US$500 million to ward off the humanitarian and political instability that the deepening poverty could unleash.
But it may be too late. Reports are streaming in of riots - food riots at that - that have broken out in Haiti, Bangladesh, Egypt, Burkino Faso, Mauritania, Indonesia and Peru. This circle of discontent could very well enlarge with more and more nations finding the situation untenable.
At home, the BoN sees no reverse in the near future, expecting food prices worldwide to continue to be put under upward pressure.
The Role of Bio-fuels in the Upward Trend
Possibly the largest contributing factor to the increase in world food prices has been the increased production in bio-fuels, which experts warned would benefit producers and disadvantage consumers if not handled properly. The experts warned that bio-fuel production would impact both the availability of food supply from production and imports and access to food, that is, entitlements and distribution of food.
The production of bio-fuels compete with food production where new agricultural land or water for irrigation on a world scale is considered to be scarce. For bio-fuels manufactured from food crops, there is direct competition for end-use of foods such as cereals, soy, sugarcane, and palm oil.
Brazil produced 15 billion litres of sugarcane-based bio-ethanol in 2006. The United States is producing 38 percent of the world's bio-ethanol from maize; Canada produces 11 percent. China is considered the third largest producer of bio-ethanol in the world. Bio-fuel production is based on grain (80 percent), derived from maize, cassava and rice.
In Africa, sugar-producing countries such as South Africa, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique and Ghana are investing in bio-ethanol production capacity.
South Africa - the southern African region's largest food exporter - has a bio-fuel producing target of 3.4 percent of its total liquid fuels by 2013, which is 4.5 percent of its transport fuel.
Thus, said experts, the rising demand for bio-fuel expansion occurs at the expense of crops and crop end-users, rather than through expansion of the agricultural frontier.
As far back as 2006, it was predicted, however, that the upward trend in food prices due to bio-fuels would be short-lived as a result of weather-related shortfalls, reduced global stocks and increased demand from main economies, according to the FAO.
But, some feared that international trade in bio-fuels could see food prices becoming more directly driven by energy prices.
The impact of bio-fuel production on food security, said experts, is of particular concern in countries where nutrition is already a concern, which is related to deferential access to food among different households and individuals.
According to the 2006 Human Development Report, at least 20 percent of Namibia's population is considered to be chronically undernourished.
How Food-secure is Namibia?
According to an agricultural economist with the Ministry of Agriculture, Mathew Ndjodhi, Namibia's aggregate cereal production is 138600 tonnes, with consumption estimated at about 360 metric tons.
With this year's floods in the north-central regions - the crop-producing regions - crop-growing conditions have reduced significantly, with yield prospects of 26 percent compared to the last six years.
In addition to the heavy rains and floods, the outbreak of armyworm reported in the Oshana and Oshikoto regions pose a threat to crops.
"Household food security is likely to improve towards April but it wont be long-lasting," predicted Ndjodhi.
Notwithstanding the floods, said Ndjodhi, the Caprivi region is expected to have a crop yield of eight percent more than the 2006/7 harvest, and by February, good yields were also expected in the Kavango.
Generally, he said, Namibia is food-secured, but with the increase in prices, the accessibility of food becomes an issue.
Economist Martin Mwinga said there is not much consumers can do at this stage, but to live within their means, and cut down on luxuries.
"While crude oil is US$100 per barrel, and there are speculations that it will increase to US$120 per barrel, we can expect the food prices to increase," said Mwinga.
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