ABSTRACT

Since 2007, global food prices have exhibited sharp increases and declines in both nominal and real terms. Despite these fluctuations, real prices have consistently remained higher than those during the relatively stable period of 1990–2006 (Figure 20.1). A recent study contends that “food price volatility (FPV) has become the new norm: people have come to expect food prices to rapidly rise and fall, though nobody knows by how much or when” (Hossain et al., 2013, p. 5).