Food prices highest since 2008

In mid-2008, international food prices reached their highest level in 30 years, sparking one of the worst food crises in recent times, toppling at least one government and pushing more than a billion people into hunger.

The global average price of food - including cereals, cooking oil, meat and dairy products - was 25 percent higher in December 2010 than in December 2009, said Abdolreza Abbassian, secretary of the Intergovernmental Group on Grains at FAO.

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