The FAO’s biannual report on global food markets was released this month. The report provides an overview of global trends for several main agricultural products, including wheat, coarse grains, rice, oilcrops, meat, and milk and fishery products, as well as a special feature on pulses. The report also provides a country-level review of major policy developments for grains, rice, oilcrops, meat, and dairy.

In December 2015, the World Trade Organization reached an agreement on the Nairobi Package , the latest set of rules governing global trade. The agreement represents some progress on several major agricultural and food issues that have held up previous negotiations, including export subsidies , food aid, public stockholding for food security purposes, special safeguard measures for Least Developed Countries (LDCs), and the global cotton trade.

Soybean futures prices have seen a lot of movement in recent weeks, beginning in April when they twice saw record daily trading in combined futures and options volume on the Chicago market. Our early warning excessive food price volatility system has immediately reflected this trend, identifying extreme positive returns, i.e. returns that exceeds the 95% conditional quantile predicted by our NEXQ model . The days in which we observe excessive volatility are identified in the graph below.
Soybean Excessive Food Price Variability

On May 12, the USAID Agrilinks program held a webinar on a new report released by the World Bank, entitled Enabling the Business of Agriculture 2016: Comparing Regulatory Good Practices . The event examined the report’s key findings and discussed the objectives and future path of the Enabling the Business of Agriculture (EBA) project .

The world’s urban population is growing rapidly. According to a new publication from The Chicago Council on Global Affairs , more people live in urban areas than rural areas today, and by 2060, 66 percent of the world’s population will live in cities. This growth is particularly obvious in developing regions. Africa’s urban population is projected to grow from its current 40 percent to 56 percent by 2050; Asia’s urban population will grow from 48 to 64 percent during the same period, while Latin America’s will rise from 80 to 90 percent.

International wheat price trends were mixed in April but were still lower than wheat prices seen a year ago, according to the latest Food Price Monitoring and Analysis Bulletin released this week. The price of US hard red winter wheat fell three percent in April as a result of improved production prospects in several key producing areas. Global maize prices were up from March due to increased export demand and concerns about production in South America; however, April maize prices also remained lower than the previous year's levels.

As the global food system becomes more integrated, urban populations grow, and incomes continue to rise around the world, the issue of food safety is drawing greater and greater attention, according to a new brief from the Global Panel on Agriculture and Food Systems for Nutrition.

Food price volatility and extreme price shocks have serious implications for politics, agriculture, climate, and food and nutrition security, according to a new book published by the Center for Development Research (ZEF) and the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) , with support from the CGIAR Research Program on Policies, Institutions, and Markets (PIM) .

Since the launch of the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) Doha Development Round negotiations in 2001, the global trade situation has undergone a dramatic transformation. Developing countries and emerging economies have become major global players, and large regional and plurilateral trade deals (so-called “mega deals”) like the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) are becoming more and more common.

Markets play a crucial role in global agricultural development and food security, and well-functioning markets require effective, transparent regulations to ensure agricultural safety, quality, and economic efficiency. The World Bank’s 2016 Enabling the Business of Agriculture report examines the current state of agricultural and agribusiness regulations across the globe and provides some important lessons.