A/HRC/9/23 page 27 Annex I THE GLOBAL FOOD CRISIS AND THE RESPONSES OF THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY: A SUMMARY 1. This Appendix briefly recalls the origins of the current global food crisis (1.), the broader historical context in which is can be understood (2.), the main impacts (3.), and the responses of the international community (4.). It should be read as a complement to the initial analysis provided by the Special Rapporteur of the global food crisis, which included data not repeated here.52 1. The origins of the global food crisis 2. Since a number of studies have been presented on the origins of the surge in the prices of food commodities in the international markets in 2007-2008,53 a brief summary of the emerging consensus may suffice here. While independent observers differ on the relative importance of the different factors which have played a role - which indeed, due to their interrelatedness, are difficult to disaggregate from one another - there is broad agreement at least on the identity of these factors. The increase in the price of oil led to a corresponding rise in the cost of producing food, both because of the costs of fertilizers and pesticides and because of the transportation, packaging and processing costs, widening the wedge between farmgate prices and prices on international markets.54 It also led to a higher demand for agrofuel feedstock, particularly maize, soybean, and palm oil, creating more competition for cropland between food, feed for livestock, and fuel, and a surge in the demand for grain. The resulting tension between supply and demand was accentuated, on the supply side, by other factors, some purely conjunctural, others more 52 See the background note on the global food crisis, www2.ohchr.org/english/issues/ food/docs/SRRTFnotefoodcrisis.pdf (2 May 2008). 53 See, inter alia, J. von Braun, The World Food Situation. New Driving Forces and Required Actions, December 2007; Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), Background note, Global Food Challenges, 23 April 2008; Joachim von Braun, Rising Food Prices. What Should be Done?, IFPRI Policy Brief, April 2008; World Bank, Rising food prices: Policy options and World Bank response, April 2008; International Food Policy Research Institute, High Food Prices: The What, Who, and How of Proposed Policy Actions, 16 May 2008; Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD), Rising Food Prices. Causes and Consequences, April 2008; Donald Mitchell, A Note on Rising Food Prices, The World Bank, Policy Research Working Paper No. 4682, July 2008; and the sources cited in the background note referred to in the preceding footnote. 54 Research from the World Bank indicates that a 10 percent rise in crude oil prices translates into a 1.6 per cent increase in agricultural commodity prices.