The time to prepare was last year. But there’s still a little bit of time left, however, how much is unknown. We should all brace ourselves for a “grocery price shock” in the coming months.
This week, the Bloomberg Agriculture Spot Index, which tracks key farm products. surged the most in almost nine years, driven by a rally in crop futures. With global food prices already at the highest since mid-2014, this latest jump is being closely watched because staple crops are a ubiquitous influence on grocery shelves — from bread and pizza dough to meat and even soda.
If you are not prepared, now is the time to stock up. Consider highly nutritious foods, such as dried beans and sugar-free peanut butter.
“There seems to be sort of a bullish force behind the prices internationally,” Abdolreza Abbassian, senior economist at the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization, said in an interview according to Bloomberg. “The indications are that there is very little reason to believe prices would remain at these levels. It’s more likely they will rise further. Hardship is still ahead.”
Whether the UN is trustworthy or not, using our own discernment and critical thinking skills we can deduce that preparations are necessary. If you have been to the grocery store lately you probably already have noticed that the prices of food have risen. This is likely a part of the overall plan to keep us in control too.
“The relentless rise in prices acts as a misery multiplier, driving millions deeper into hunger and desperation,” Chris Nikoi, the World Food Programme’s regional director for West Africa, said earlier this month. It’s “pushing a basic meal beyond the reach of millions of poor families who were already struggling to get by.”
The warning signs that the food supply will eventually crash have been there since the beginning of the COVID-19 scamdemic. Shutting down meat processing plants and seeing the weather devastate crops should have been enough to spur at least a moderate amount of preparedness, just in case. But then the Suez canal was blocked, the need to prepare should have become obvious.
Stock up and be ready. No one knows when or how bad this price shock will be, but based on the amount of money creation and the supply chain issues, we should all be expecting something to impact the food market.
This is a guest post by Mac Slavo of shtfplan.com.