From: GERALD LEVY (gerald_a_levy@MSN.COM)
Date: Wed Dec 12 2007 - 13:18:13 EST
What I am talking about is a "structural" increase in food prices. It is of course true, that if a lot more food is produced that prices are likely to drop again, but in the context of modern agribusiness, market monopolies, food-for-fuel production, food futures, transport costs and the like, and given the geopolitical balance of power, population growth and consumption habits, my hunch is that we are looking at a relatively PERMANENT structural increase in food prices, just as the increase in home prices since 1980 is largely a permanent, structural increase, within a margin of perhaps 10-20% fluctuation. =================================== Hi Jurriaan: What about the consequences of technological change in agriculture? You seem to be discounting the possibility of advances in constant fixed and constant circulating capital which could have the consequence of raising the productivity of labour in agriculture and (perhaps) leading to lower food prices. In solidarity, Jerry
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