Pre-existing global food security challenges which have extended into 2023 may well become more acute as the year progresses on account of what the World Economic Forum says is a likely global rice shortage and an expectation that prices for one of the world’s most consumed foods will rise higher.
A World Economic Forum (WEF) article published earlier this year asserts that the global market for rice could face its most severe shortage in decades, a circumstance that could have a knock-on effect on global food security. The WEF is quoting “industry analysts” as saying that this year the rice industry “is expected to experience its largest deficit between supply and demand in 20 years, adding that that prevailing high rice prices are a holdover from the start of the COVID-19 pandemic made worse by falling production in some of the world’s rice-producing ‘heavyweights’ including China and Pakistan as well as the United States and Europe. Additionally, Putin’s war in Ukraine drastically pushed up the cost of wheat, which in turn has increased demand for grain alternatives like rice,” the article says.