São Paulo – Food prices gauged by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) remained on the downward curve that is now several months long, with a 1.2% reduction in April from March this year. The FAO Food Price Index scored 171, the lowest since 2010. In April from April 2014, prices were down 19.2%, according to numbers released this Thursday (7th).
The FAO’s index tracks five different commodity groups: dairy, sugar, cereals, vegetable oils and meat. The only group whose prices went up was meat – for the first time since August of last year.
FAO notes that cereals production this year could even fall short of 2014’s, due to smaller planted area. The report released in tandem with the index issues a forecast that food costs will likely continue going down, as a consequence of abundant supplies and the high US dollar.
For the next few months, the organization expects global sugar and meat outputs to increase, and remarks that fish is becoming increasingly popular in the world diet, as a consequence of fish farming investments. The FAO also claims poor countries should benefit from the low food prices.
*Translated by Gabriel Pomerancblum
