Food Crisis, Drought | featured news

David Frum says the drought is driving up world food prices, and history suggests that is likely to produce unrest within poor nations. Prediction: 2013 will be a year of serious global crisis. That crisis is predictable, and in fact has already begun. It will inescapably confront the next president of the United States. Yet this emerging crisis got not a mention at the Republican National Convention in Tampa. We'll see if the Democrats do better.

Leading members of the Group of 20 nations are prepared to trigger an emergency meeting to tackle soaring grain prices caused by the worst U.S. drought in half a century and poor crops from the Black Sea bread basket.

Global alarm over a potential repeat of the 2008 food crisis escalated on Thursday after data showed food prices had jumped 6 percent last month and importers were snapping up a shriveled U.S. grain crop, helping drive corn prices to a new record.