In Progress

Perhaps the most influential orthodox view on the causes, dynamics and solution to the food price crisis was provided by Oxford University economist Paul Collier in an article that came out in Foreign Affairs.1 Collier, author of the controversial The Bottom Billion,2 asserted that the food price crisis stemmed from the increased demand for food in Asia, brought on by prosperity that was not matched on the supply side owing to three problems: the failure to promote commercial farming especially in Africa, the ban against genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in the European Union (EU), and the diversion of around a third of American grain to the production of ethanol instead of food.