Obesity Surgery May Become Option for Many More

December 2, 2010 · Posted in Forex Exchange · Comments Off 

Food and Drug Administration advisers will consider a request by a pharmaceutical company to lower how obese someone must be to qualify for surgery using its device.

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U.N. Calls Emergency Meeting Over Rising World Food Prices

September 28, 2010 · Posted in Forex · Comments Off 
Linda Young – AHN News Writer

Rome, Italy (AHN) – United Nations officials warned of a major new world food crisis Friday at an emergency meeting over rising international food prices

The U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) called the meeting in Rome to discuss the looming crisis. FAO officials blame recent environmental disasters as well as rampant speculative trading on commodity futures markets by investors.

Although food prices have not risen as much as they did during the 2008 food crisis, FAO officials were concerned.

“The FAO has recognized a variety of drivers behind food price spikes, such as drought, energy prices and trade restrictions; however, the impact of crude oil prices on food inflation cuts across all national boundaries and has a disproportionate impact on food prices,” said Bliss Baker, a spokesperson for Global Renewable Fuels Alliance.

“As long as we are dependent on crude oil for our primary source of energy, we will continue to see food prices climb as crude oil prices climb,” Baker added.

However, other forces are at work to increase food prices, according to the U.N.’s special rapporteur on food, Olivier De Schutter. In a paper released earlier this week, De Schutter said that as other investments turned sour and lost investor interest–including overvalued asset backed securitization investments–investors looking for profits flocked to invest in food commodity futures because everyone must eat.

“Beginning at the end of 2001, food commodities derivatives markets, and commodities indexes in particular began to see an influx of non-traditional investors, such as pension funds, hedge funds, sovereign wealth funds, and large banks that packaged and dealt the commodity index instruments,” De Schutter wrote. “The reason for this was simply because other markets dried up one by one: the dotcoms vanished at the end of 2001, the stock market soon after, and the U.S. housing market in August 2007.”

“As each bubble burst, these large institutional investors moved into other markets, each traditionally considered more stable than the last. Strong similarities can be seen between the price behavior of food commodities and other refuge values, such as gold. As the European Commission notes, the prices of both had been largely stable, began to rise slowly in 2005, and accelerated sharply in August 2007, when the subprime crisis hit. Similar behavior obtained in oil markets, which hit the $100 per barrel mark in February 2008 and peaked in June 2008, only to fall back subsequently,” De Schutter said.

De Schutter calls for regulation of the food commodity markets in a report titled “Food Commodities Speculation and Food Price Crises, Regulation to reduce the risks of price volatility.” The full report is available at: srfood.org/images/stories/pdf/otherdocuments/20102309_briefing_note_02_en.pdf

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Spend Wisely to Save Money

November 28, 2009 · Posted in Currency Trading · Comments Off 

Have you ever noticed that the things you buy every week at the grocery and hardware stores go up a few cents between shopping trips? Not by much…just by a little each week but they continue to creep up and up.

All it takes for the price to jump up by a lot is a little hiccup in the world wide market, note the price of gasoline as it relates to world affairs.

There is a way that we can keep these price increases from impacting our personal finances so much and that is by buying in quantity and finding the best possible prices for the things we use and will continue to use everyday… things that will keep just as well on the shelves in our homes as it does on the shelves at the grocery store or hardware store.

For instance, dog food and cat food costs about 10% less when bought by the case than it does when bought at the single can price and if you wait for close out prices you save a lot more than that.

Set aside some space in your home and make a list of things that you use regularly which will not spoil. Any grain or grain products will need to be stored in airtight containers that rats can’t get into so keep that in mind.

Then set out to find the best prices you can get on quantity purchases of such things as bathroom items and dry and canned food.

You will be surprised at how much you can save by buying a twenty pound bag of rice as opposed to a one pound bag but don’t forget that it must be kept in a rat proof container.

You can buy some clothing items such as men’s socks and underwear because those styles don’t change, avoid buying children’s and women’s clothing, those styles change and sizes change too drastically.

Try to acquire and keep a two year supply of these items and you can save hundreds of dollars.

Would you like to know more?
Check out this site for more information about the above topic!

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