'Day by day': Trade bans, inflation send food prices soaring
Soki Wu's food stall, tucked in a food court in a shopping mall in Singapore, is a crowd favorite for its fresh, juicy “chicken rice," a national dish. But customers recently began complaining that his chicken didn't taste quite as good as it used to.
Wu was forced to switch to frozen chicken after Malaysia banned exports last month of live broiler chickens that are more affordable and better tasting in a bid to offset rising local prices. For Singapore, which sources a third of its poultry from Malaysia, the impact was immediate.
“This is unavoidable. Using frozen chickens have affected the taste of the dish, but we have no choice,” Wu said.
As inflation surges around the world, politicians are scrambling for ways to keep food affordable as people increasingly protest the soaring cost of living. One knee-jerk response has been food export bans aimed at protecting domestic prices and supplies as a growing number of governments in developing nations try to show a nervous public that their needs will be met.
For business owners, the rising cost of cooking ingredients — from oil to chicken — has prompted them to raise prices, with people paying 10% to 20% more at Wu's food stall. For consumers, it has meant paying more for the same or lesser-quality food or curbing certain habits altogether.
In Lebanon, where endemic corruption and political stalemate has crippled the economy, the U.N. World Food Program is increasingly providing people with cash assistance to buy food, particularly after a devastating 2020 port blast that destroyed massive grain silos. Constant power cuts and high fuel prices for generators limit what people can buy because they can't rely on freezers and refrigerators to store perishables.
Tracy Saliba, a single mother of two and business owner in...