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The U.S. Agriculture Department lowered its forecast of corn yield per acre from 166 busherls per acre to 123.4 after a severe drought in the U.S. The projected corn harvest is expected to come in at 10.8 billion bushels, 13% smaller than the 12.4 billion bushels in 2011. The USDA forecast for corn price in August 2012 was raised at the upper end to $8.90 per bushel, up 39% from a month ago.

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UN programs to reduce food storage losses in Pakistan by using metal storage containers instead of jute bags and mud silos protect grain from insects, rats and water. This has cut losses in storage of grains by upto 70%.

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In June 2012 India's Food Minister K.V. Thomas agreed that 13% of India's 50.2 millon of wheat grains from a record crop were under makeshift shelters which could be damaged by the monsoon rains. Another complicating factor is that a law from the 1980's intended to protect workers in the jute industry requires all packaging of foodgrains for storage to use jute bags. Since 1990 jute products have increased by about 30% compared to an increase of 82% for the wheat crop, as a result there is a severe shortage of jute bags to store foodgrains in states like Madhya Pradesh.

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Alex Frangos and Sudeep Jain's interview with Duvvuri Subbarao, the governor of the Reserve Bank of India, India's central bank. India's economy is slowing with higher inflation, higher interest rates, inability of the government to make firm decisions on foreign investment, a declining currency, and a growing deficit. Subbarao has come under criticism for keeping interest rates low for too long after the 2008 financial crisis, and then as higher inflation persisted making a number of interest rate increases in 2011, which reduced the credit flows in the Indian economy. Subbarao's defense of his policy of not acting earlier on interest rates and then raising interest rates repeatedly, is that the economy need stimulus in the years after the global financial crisis. He says the inflation in the early stages was a result of a supply shock in food prices and would not have responded to interest rate adjustments. Inflation declined from 9.1% in November 2011 to 7.5% in December. Subbarao says the interest rate increases are over and he is looking for the right time to increase credit flows in the economy. His remaining concerns are with the fiscal deficit, and he called on the finance minister to map out what he plans to do for the fiscal deficit. He expects the deficit for the current fiscal year to increase from 4.6% to 5.5%, as the cost of fuel subisides rises and tax receipts decline. He calls for the removal of subsidies on liquified natural gas and electricity, but concedes that this will be difficult in an election year. Looking back Subbarao sense is that the central bank's policy actions were well calibrated....

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About 60% of the population in Guinea, Sierra Leone, and Liberia, countries worst affected by the Ebola virus are facing food shortages. Markets are closed in these countries reducing access to food. The virus is affecting West Africa in other ways. Ample food supplies with lower prices of corn, wheat and rice on world markets, as a result of supplies from Brazil, India and Thailand, is not reaching Africa because of restricted access because of Ebola. Clogged ports, and conflicts adding to this reduced access. In East Africa the FAO estimates 20 millon people face food shortages up from 15 million estimate earlier. The rise in value of the dollar in relation to African currencies is increasing prices of food. Food price inflation is leading to a situation where an household with many children in a relatively better off country like Uganda being able to afford only one meal a day. The result will be increase in malnutrition in Africa if solutions are not found to get access to large food supplies outside Africa with lower prices. ...

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11 Pacific Rim nations form the Trans-Pacific Partnership in 2018. The Obama administration supported the trade pact alienating supporters in its union base particularly in the midwestern states. Mr. Trump opposed the TPP in his election campaign and made it a significant issue for swing voters in midwestern states after job losses in the auto industry. With the opposition of president Trump the U.S. decided to withdraw from TPP.  The 11 nations agreeing to join a revised agreement are Japan, Canada, Mexico, Australia, Brunei, Chile, Malaysia, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam. So far six countries have formally approved the deal, Australia, Canada, Mexico, Singapore, New Zealand and Japan, setting the stage for two rounds of tariff reductions starting December 30, 2018. Agricultural products duties will be duty free within 3 to 7 years including for Japan and Mexico. Australia, New Zealand, Canada are major agricultural exporters. Japan supported the deal as a way to counter China's influence in the region. In the U.S. the gains would be in intellectual property rights but losses for workers in the auto and manufacturing industries, a point Mr. Trump recognized in his election campaign as he campaigned in the midwestern states. Mr. Obama pursued TPP over objections of workers organizations and unions including auto workers union, with his advisors suggesting this as a way to counter China's influence in the region. By 2018 the Democratic party support base fractured on this as one of the major issues.   ...

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The TPP as negotiated by Nov. 2015 gives biologics drugs 8 years of protection. Senator Hatch of Utah and the pharmaceutical industry seek 12 years of protection to recoup costly investments in these drugs. Japan says the agreement would be difficult to renegotiate. There is opposition to extending it beyond 8 years in many TPP countries.

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James Q. Wilson points to the link between educational levels and inequality. He says the poor face too few skills and too few opportunities. The link with education is critical. He cites information from the Bureau of Labor Statistics which show that between 1979 and 2010, hourly wages for those with a college degree went up 33% for men and 20% for women. For those without a high school diploma wages declined 31% for men and 9% for women. It appears that men have been more adversely affected than women. Minorities have done poorly especially Hispanics and Blacks. Social factors such as unwed mothers aggravate conditions for the bottom fifth in incomes. As the demographics of America shift to higher population of Hispanic immigrants, the situation worsens. High schools in Hispanic areas of New York city with high dropout rates, to take one example, can affect income inequality as more immigrants take jobs at the minimum wage level. The 2008 financial crisis has also taken a higher toll on minorities and people with modest incomes by reducing their savings and through the large number of home foreclosures....

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This report in The South China Morning Post in Hong Kong, gives insights into the Chinese position in trade war with the U.S.  China has its own internal groups which support China being able to take a leadership role in world affairs. Xi Jinping made giving China a prominent role in the world a feature of his presidency. China  has this internal audience and its own sense that China's resurgence was won with hard work and cooperation, plus dedication of the Chinese people. In the past Japan and South Korea also used state subsidized industries, and subsidies to gain leadership in key business sectors involving high technology. China would see this state subsidies model as its own model of development. From this standpoint the U.S. demands on subsidies as unfair competition could be seen as changing a key part of its economic model.  Asking China to put everything in writing and show tangible proof of enforcement as the U.S. insisted in talks, was too much for the Chinese side. China said trust us to do this, and lift the tariffs based on our verbal assurances. The U.S. having seen decades of no progress on this point, wanted tangible proof before tariffs were lifted. Added to the demands on subsidies were the demands for no more of what the U.S. calls stealing of U.S. technology through forced transfer of technology by U.S. firms as a condition to operate in Chinese markets. With the U.S. lagging in 5G technology and Huawei ahead the issue resonates on the U.S. side. Add to this Mr. Trump's key voter base includes the former Democratic party supporting workers who have shifted to him because of trade agreements and policies of Clinton and Obama that hurt American workers through seemingly endless closure of manufacturing plants from Chinese competition.   ...

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China's National Bureau of Statistics made an announcement in Beiijing that 51.27% of the Chinese people now live in urban areas. In 1949 the figure was 10.6%, in 1979 it was 19%. In the space of three decades China has urbanized rapidly. This has brought with it economic growth, infrastructure development and increased employment in the manufacturing sector as new workers moved from rural areas to the cities. With it also come major problems for the country and the leaders of the Communist party led government. Of the 691 million urban residents, 253 million are migrant workers- 37% of urban residents and 19% of the population are in this grey zone described as the "hukou" or household registration system. Under "hukou" these migrants from rural areas cannot access public services in the cities, and have rights to access them in their own villages where they are registered. Integrating these migrant workers who are different than their more affluent and better educated neigbors in the cities so that they become truly a part of the urban areas will remain a huge challenge for China. One of the ways China is addressing this is with the plan to build 36 million units of affordable housing for these migrant workers by 2016. Ever so gradually Chinese officials are relaxing the restrictions on migrant workers- such as Shanghai Mayor Han Zheng's announcement for allowing all migrant workers to rent subsidized housing in the outer parts of Shanghai and committing to "increase the migrant population's involvement in the community affairs, cultural life and show genuine care for them." Food security is another issue as more development on prime agricultural land means less land available for agriculture. Appropriation of agricultural land for industrial use is bringing the country down to the limit of 120 million hectares of agricultural land needed for self sufficiency in food, according to the Land Ministry. At the same time China's leaders want to avoid what the World Bank calls "the middle income trap," where a country reaches a level of modernization and urbanization, and then stalls at that level- the level being around $3000 per capital GDP, which is China's GDP per capita today, according to the National Bureau of Statistics in China. Li Keqiang, who takes over from premier Wen Biao, sees the building of affordable housing for migrant workers as a critical way to continue the urbanization process, and shift the country from its export focus by increasing consumption and the development of industries that support this. A slowing economy dominated by state owned companies focussed on a decelerating export model and an aging but still growing population- NBS says China's overall population was up by 4.8% in 2011 over 2010 and has reached 1.35 billion- presents a tougher set of challenges to the new leadership in China than was faced by the current leadership....

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The Journal cites figures from the U.S. Department of Agriculture showing 44.7 million participated in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance program in fiscal 2011. This is a big jump from the 28.2 million people in 2008. Texas has 4 million on food stamps, California 3.7 millon, Florida 3.1 million.