We estimate rural household income uncertainties and welfare changes due to commodity price and production variability in Ghana and Peru under different scenarios for international and domestic market shocks. Uncertainties significantly affect the variability of household income, especially for...

The food price spikes of 2007/08 have revived global awareness of the persistent problem of hunger and food insecurity all over the world, and turned the spotlight back onto the critical importance of food and nutritional security for economic development and political stability. Accordingly,...

The paper first reviews several issues relevant to global food commodity market volatility as it pertains to food security, and food importing developing countries, and then discusses international and national policies and measures to prevent or manage this volatility and related risks. It is...

Studies of risk and its consequences tend to focus on one risk factor, such as a drought or an economic crisis. Yet 2003 household surveys in rural Kilimanjaro and Ruvuma, two cash-crop-growing regions in Tanzania that experienced a precipitous coffee price decline around the turn of the...

The prices of many staple food commodities have increased substantially over the past year. As a result, many developing countries are facing larger food import bills. The cereal import bill of the world’s poorest countries is forecast to rise by 56 percent in 2007/08, following an already...

This comment to the article by de Janvry and Sadoulet highlights the prospects for developing and least developed countries in world food markets. The Author puts the recent agricultural price developments in perspective and suggests what trade policies ought to be implemented to enhance...

The extent to which commodity price volatility affects the income of producing households and their vulnerability to poverty and food insecurity depends on household diversification patterns and the degree of their exposure to markets. This article focuses on estimating agricultural income...