This morning’s Washington post featured Argentina in an article about global rising food prices.
“Argentina is famous for its beef. But over the past year, lower meat consumption has threatened even the country’s famed “asado” barbecues.
“The problem is price. In just a year, the price per kilogram of short rib has surged over 90 percent, according to the Institute for the Promotion of Argentine Beef.
“In January, meat industry sources began complaining that meat consumption had fallen to record lows in the country, with annual beef consumption down to 49.7 kilograms per person in 2020 — less than half of its peak in 1956.
“The politics of meat prices are particularly dicey in Argentina,” said Benjamin Gedan, head of the Argentina Project at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, noting that the government had been forced to take the drastic measure of stopping all beef exports for a month. Chinese demand had given the country a supply of U.S. dollars.
“Even with inflation, a major problem in Argentina over recent years, expected to hit 50 percent this year, the government of Alberto Fernández has made food a priority. “Nothing worries me more than the hunger of Argentines,” Fernández said in May.“
https://www.washingtonpost.com…F60e429a89d2fda8060f91e81
Here are a couple of the comments following the article:
Single product economies coupled with government mismanagement are probably some of the major problems of many countries. They continued election and reelection of leaders with little to no vision and inflated egos and a willingness to steal from their own country on a routine basis coupled with inability to manage even their daily schedule much less their economy are the major reasons why most of these countries cannot supply basics to the people without excess inflation.
And
For me this is the scariest development and threat to global security. People who are hungry will do anything and go anywhere to survive, and those who are stuck with no recourse will fight to the death for that last piece of bread. Famine is the root cause of most wars and migrations. Not good.
