ABSTRACT
Since the turn of the century, the world has experienced a huge variation in the prices of commodities, known as a commodity price super-cycle. In real terms, a wide range of agricultural and mineral commodity prices rose sharply over this time to exceed the previous historical highs of the 1970s, but then receded sharply. Increased commodity demand in rapidly industrialising Asian economies, particularly China and India, contributed to the price rises, as did low real interest rates, which encouraged commodity stockpiling in anticipation of even higher future prices.
