By Gwynne Dyer
5:30 AM Saturday Jan 15, 2011
If all the food in the world were shared out evenly, there would be enough to go around. That has been true for centuries now - if food was scarce, the problem was that it wasn't in the right place.
But there was no global shortage. However, that will not be true much longer.
The food riots began in Algeria more than a week ago, and they are going to spread. During the last global food shortage, in 2008, there was serious rioting in Mexico, Indonesia and Egypt. We may expect to see that again, only more widespread.
Most people in these countries live in a cash economy and a large proportion live in cities. They buy their food, they don't grow it. That makes them vulnerable, because they have to eat almost as much as people in rich countries do but their incomes are much lower.
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