In Catch 22, Joseph Heller’s fictionalised war drags on so long that the opposing air forces decide to just bomb themselves to save time. It’s a surreal thought, but the way we conduct some of our international trade is just as senseless. Reading Moveable Feasts, I was reminded of some examples of ecologically wasteful trade. [...]
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What’s going on in the food markets?
In 2008 there was a food crisis, as you may remember. It was started by droughts and poor harvests in some major grain exporting countries, with prices pushed higher by the runaway price of oil. Demand for biofuels diverted more crops away from the priority of feeding people, and the whole crisis was exacerbated by [...]
Speculating in the cocoa fields
This weekend I noticed another story about speculation in commodities, this time in cocoa. Since the commodity markets don’t get nearly enough attention, or enough outrage in my opinion, I’ve posted this story alongside an earlier one that explains how commodity markets work. The latest speculation debacle is in the cocoa market, where the prices [...]
What’s on the G20′s mind?
Just put the G20′s statement (pdf) through Wordle to get a snapshot of their discussions this week. ‘Growth’ occurs 67 times ‘Climate change’ occurs 4 times ‘Poverty’ is mentioned 4 times There is no mention of the oil price The search terms ‘justice’ and ‘human rights’ return no results
Peak oil and the developing world
Having mentioned this morning that it is very rare to hear anything about peak oil and developing countries, I was pleased to come across this article by Sir David King. “Our analysis predicts that prices will soon be considerably more than $100 a barrel, peaking at around $130 by 2015″ he says, citing work by [...]
Falling off the Edge, by Alex Perry
Alex Perry is a foreign correspondent who has travelled extensively in the developing world, reporting from across Africa and Asia. He is of that increasingly rare breed of journalists who believes in going and seeing things for yourself, a philosophy that has led him well off the beaten track. What he has found in the [...]
The bigger questions swirling in the volcanic ash
The British navy has been mobilised today to bring home thousands of tourists trapped overseas by clouds of volcanic ash. Flights will hopefully resume again tomorrow, after six days of grounded planes all across Europe. Schools are in disorder as teachers and pupils alike are unable to get home. The airlines have been losing £130 [...]
Book review: The case against the global economy, and for a turn towards localization
I haven’t posted a book review for a few weeks, as I’ve been ploughing my way through this rather large reader, The case against the global economy, and for a turn towards the local, a collection of essays edited by Jerry Mander and Edward Goldsmith. It was published in 1996, as anti-globalization sentiment was really [...]
More aid money, or fewer subsidies?
Some numbers I picked up from Enough: why the world’s poorest starve in an age of plenty, by Roger Thurow and Scott Kilman.
Hans Rosling on middle income countries
The idea of a split between developed and developing is a fifty year old idea, says Hans Rosling: (Don’t miss the little development race he runs about 15 minutes in) If you haven’t come across him before, Rosling is on a mission to make statistics interesting. Gapminder is his company, and there are some amazing [...]
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