Day: March 4, 2023

Rome. The benchmark international food price index fell in February for the 11th consecutive month, albeit only slightly, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) reported today.

The FAO Food Price Index averaged 129.8 points in February, i.e. slightly down (0.6%) from January, but 18.7% below the peak which it reached in March 2022. The decrease in the index, which shows the monthly variation in international prices of the most traded food products, reflected falls in the prices of vegetable oils and dairy products that more than offset a sharp increase in prices. sugar prices.

The FAO Cereal Price Index was broadly the same as in January. International wheat prices increased slightly during the month, as concerns about dry conditions in the United States of America and robust demand for supplies from Australia were largely offset by strong competition among exporters. International rice prices declined 0.1% due to slower trade activities in most major Asian exporting countries, whose currencies also depreciated against the US dollar.

The FAO Vegetable Oil Price Index fell 3.2 percent compared to January, and world prices for palm, soybean, sunflower and rapeseed oils also fell.

The FAO Dairy Price Index fell 2.7 percent over the month, with international quotations for butter and skimmed milk powder recording the sharpest declines.

The FAO Meat Price Index was also almost unchanged from January. World poultry meat prices continued to decline amid ample export supplies, despite outbreaks of bird flu in several major producing countries, while pork prices rose, mainly due to concerns regarding the scarcity of exportable supplies in Europe.

By contrast, the FAO Sugar Price Index increased by 6.9 percent compared to January, reaching its highest level in six years, mainly due to the downward revision of the production forecast for 2022-23 in India, as well as the decrease in international prices of crude oil and ethanol in Brazil.

Early production prospects for the 2023 wheat crops

In its cereal supply and demand briefing note , also released on Friday, FAO released its initial forecast for world wheat production in 2023, predicting a resulting global output of 784 million tonnes, which would be the second highest harvest on record, although lower than the previous year. A bumper crop is expected in North America as farmers have increased acreage in response to high grain prices.

In the countries of the southern hemisphere, production prospects for the 2023 coarse grain crops are generally favourable, and aggregate maize plantings in Brazil are anticipated to increase to a record level.

The FAO has also revised upwards its forecast for world cereal production in 2022 to 2,774 million tonnes, a value that is still 1.3% lower than in 2021.

World cereal utilization in 2022-23 is forecast to be 2.78 billion tonnes, down 0.6 percent from the previous season, largely due to an anticipated contraction of the utilization of all major coarse grains.

FAO forecasts world grain stocks ending in 2023 to decline by 1.2 percent from their opening levels, a reduction to 844 million tonnes, as forecast declines in stocks are expected to decline. stocks of coarse grains and, to a lesser extent, rice offset an expected build in wheat stocks. According to the new projections, the global cereal reserves-to-utilization ratio would remain at 29.5 percent, which is considered a “generally comfortable level”.

Grain trade is forecast to contract by 1.8% to 473 million tonnes.

Crop prospects and food situation

Droughts, conflicts and high prices, along with macroeconomic problems, are exacerbating food insecurity in many countries. The assessments carried out confirm that a total of 45 countries around the world are in need of external food assistance, according to the latest report Crop Prospects and Food Situation , a quarterly publication of the Global Information and Early Warning System on Food and Agriculture (GIEWS) of FAO, also published today.

Some people in six countries are experiencing, or are expected to soon experience, elevated levels of acute food insecurity, defined as Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) Phase 5, or catastrophic hunger: Burkina Faso, Haiti, Mali, Nigeria, Somalia and South Sudan. Millions more face severe hunger, according to the report.

Although the FAO Food Price Index has declined slightly in recent months, domestic food price inflation is at extremely high levels in many countries. For example, coarse grain prices in Ghana in January were 150 percent higher than a year earlier, and grain prices were at record highs in Malawi and Zambia. According to the report, the total increase in cereal production in the 47 low-income, food-deficit countries(LIFDC) in the current crop season has helped mitigate the impact of rising world prices for staple foods, but declines in production and weak currencies in many others will keep the cost of food imports down of LIFDCs at high levels.

In the report Crop Prospects and Food Situation , offers more insights from around the world, highlighting the alarming situation in East Africa, which is experiencing the worst drought in 40 years.

Source: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations

Situation Overview & Humanitarian Needs

Throughout 2022, children continued to face multidimensional humanitarian crises across West and Central Africa region. UNICEF’s Regional Humanitarian Appeal for Children focuses on 10 countries without a dedicated inter-agency Humanitarian Response Plan, but with unmet humanitarian needs.

In Benin, Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana and Togo, UNICEF supported populations facing rising emergency needs and a deteriorating security situation due to the impacts of spill-over from conflicts in the Central Sahel. On the border between The Gambia and Senegal, clashes between Senegalese security forces and separatist groups in March and April 2022 resulted in population displacement and humanitarian needs. Across the region, public health threats and disease outbreak remain widespread, from COVID-19 to Marburg Virus and Mpox, as well as persistent outbreaks of malaria, cholera, and other diseases. UNICEF Country Offices also supported populations facing natural hazards including seasonal floods

Source: UN Children’s Fund

Drugs known as statins are the first-choice treatment for high cholesterol but millions of people who can’t or won’t take those pills because of side effects may have another option.

In a major study, a different kind of cholesterol-lowering drug named Nexletol reduced the risk of heart attacks and some other cardiovascular problems in people who can’t tolerate statins, researchers reported Saturday.

Doctors already prescribe the drug, known chemically as bempedoic acid, to be used together with a statin to help certain high-risk patients further lower their cholesterol. The new study tested Nexletol without the statin combination — and offers the first evidence that it also reduces the risk of cholesterol-caused health problems.

Statins remain “the cornerstone of cholesterol-lowering therapies,” stressed Dr. Steven Nissen of the Cleveland Clinic, who led the study.

But people who can’t take those proven pills “are very needy patients, they’re extremely difficult to treat,” he said. This option “will have a huge impact on public health.”

Too much so-called LDL or “bad” cholesterol can clog arteries and lead to heart attacks and strokes. Statin pills like Lipitor and Crestor – or their cheap generic equivalents – are the mainstay for lowering LDL cholesterol and preventing heart disease or treating those who already have it. They work by blocking some of the liver’s cholesterol production.

But some people suffer serious muscle pain from statins. While it’s not clear exactly how often that occurs, by some estimates 10% of people who’d otherwise qualify for the pills can’t or won’t take them. They have limited options, including pricey cholesterol-lowering shots and another kind of pill sold as Zetia.

Nexletol also blocks cholesterol production in the liver but in a different way than statins and without that muscle side effect.

The new five-year study tracked nearly 14,000 people who were unable to tolerate more than a very low dose of a statin. Half got daily Nexletol and half a dummy pill.

The main finding: Nexletol-treated patients had a 13% lower risk of a group of major cardiac problems. Then researchers teased apart those different conditions and found a 23% reduced risk of a heart attack, the biggest impact. The drug also cut by 19% procedures to unclog arteries. There wasn’t a difference in deaths, which researchers couldn’t explain but said might require longer to detect.

The data was published in the New England Journal of Medicine and presented Saturday at a meeting of the American College of Cardiology. The study was funded by Nexletol maker Esperion Therapeutics.

The results are “compelling,” Dr. John H. Alexander of Duke University, who wasn’t involved with the study, wrote in the journal. They “will and should” spur use of the drug by patients unwilling or unable to take statins.

“It is premature, however, to consider bempedoic acid as an alternative to statins,” he cautioned. “Given the overwhelming evidence of the vascular benefits,” statins remain the top choice for most patients.

Source: Voice of America

A top UN official has warned that “urgent” measures are needed to help 52 countries facing debt repayment problems that put some at risk of default.

Achim Steiner, head of the United Nations Development Programme, said that 25 of the 52 were spending more than a fifth of government revenues servicing external debt.

“The situation right now for developing countries when it comes to national debt is indeed very, very serious,” Steiner said in an interview on the sidelines of the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) summit in Doha on Saturday.

The UN agency estimates that “52 countries are either in debt distress or one step away from debt distress and potential default,” he said.

Steiner did not name the countries involved but the UNDP last week released a report which called for a 30 percent write-off of external debt for 52 countries at 2021 values.

The 52 included Argentina, Lebanon and Ukraine alongside 23 countries from sub-Saharan Africa, 10 from Latin America and the Caribbean, and eight from East Asia and the Pacific.

Steiner said “the financial markets are not paying enough attention” as the 52 account for only three percent of global external debt, but one sixth of the world’s population.

Twenty-five countries spending one fifth of government revenues on debt servicing is “not sustainable”, he added.

“Therefore, we have called very clearly for urgent ways to inject liquidity while also restructuring and rescheduling debts, because otherwise we may see country after country falling into that territory of debt distress.”

On Saturday, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres slammed the world’s rich countries and energy giants for burdening LDCs with “predatory” interest rates.

Poor nations’ debt has multiplied over the past decade because of the coronavirus pandemic, high food and fuel bills and financial crises.

Several have defaulted over the past two years.

Steiner said that African countries such as Nigeria, Mali and Burkina Faso have lost up to 20 years of development progress amid a rise in political violence and government failures to provide basic services, security, health and education.

He said total debt was difficult to establish as more than 60 percent is owed to private creditors.

“Now you have the war in Ukraine, you have the impact on the global food and energy prices and particularly when it comes to debts, the impact of inflation is driving interest rates up,” he said.

Rising fuel costs have caused “a short-term shock” for countries struggling to maintain basic fiscal stability, according to Steiner.

And they face growing pressure to invest in renewable energy and combating climate change, the UN official added.

“Inevitably, the ability of poorer countries and middle-income countries to significantly expand in clean energy infrastructure… is being affected,” he said, calling for greater international investment in “clean and affordable electricity” for poorer nations.

Steiner said that energy security has become such a hot international topic in the past two years that he expected an “exponential increase” in investment in clean energy infrastructure in the next five years.

Source: Nam News Network