The strong recovery in the prices of vegetable oils, in particular palm oil (read: Cocoa , coffee , cotton ,
palm, rice, sugar: the health of the markets in 2019) caused a further increase of 2.5% – the third
row – food prices in December. Thus, the FAO commodity price index
food is at its highest level for 5 years. All food products are increasing in
December, says the FAO.
Over the whole of 2019, the Index rose by 1.8% compared to 2018.
FAO vegetable oil price index rose 9.4% for sixth month
consecutive. The latest rise was once again driven by palm oil prices, encouraged by both
by strong demand, especially in the biofuels sector, and by concern about the contraction of
supplies. Despite the rise in December - which also affected soybean, sunflower and
rapeseed - the vegetable oil sub-index reached its lowest annual average during 2019
since 2007.
The FAO sugar price index rose 4.8% driven in part by higher sugar prices.
crude oil that encouraged sugar refineries to use more sugar cane for production
of ethanol, with the effect of reducing the availability of sugar on the world market.
The FAO dairy price index rose 3.3%, supported by the price of cheese which
increased by nearly 8% despite reduced export availabilities from the European Union and
Oceania.
The FAO Cereals Price Index rose by 1.4%, mainly driven by the price of
wheat, despite the growing demand for imports from China and the logistical problems that France
has known because of the incessant demonstrations in the country. However, price quotations for maize and rice
remained generally stable.
The FAO meat price index is almost stable but over the year, it rose by 18% compared to
December 2018, due to the rise in pork prices caused by both strong demand
imports from Asia and pre-holiday domestic demand from the European Union and
from Brazil.