Because Egypt imports almost 50% of its wheat, you need to watch what how it handles a food shortage scare.
The price of wheat is going to go through the roof because of the flooding in Australia.
abcnews.go.com...
But some say this massive rain is helping to end the drount and should boost wheat production next year to possible record highs.
www.businessweek.com...
So what is person to believe? Overall, the world is in a wheat deficit and will be for the foreseeable future. Aussie flooding is going to affect
this spring's crop and export quotas placed on the Ukraine's wheat crop is causing farmers to plant less since they can't sell outside of their
domestic market.
www.agrimoney.com...
A lack of wheat for Egypt has meant riots in the past and it will mean riots in the future. Egypt can absorb the 40% jump in trade deficit for now,
but if it continues, look for rioting and possible political destabilization.
Say what you will about the following source being a socialist site, the info contained in the article is solid. You have to look past the socialist
rhetoric to see the importance of Egypt to US policy in the Middle East. Tuesday should be interesting in Egypt.
www.wsws.org...
Since the beginning of the revolutionary turmoil in Tunisia, there have been continuous warnings in the media and by politicians of the danger
that the protests could spread to other countries in the region or the entire Arab world. Above all, Egypt stands at the centre of such fears.
It is the most important ally of US imperialism in the region and the most populous country, with some 80 million inhabitants. The fear is that
were the Egyptian masses to begin to move, the entire imperialist strategy and all of the bourgeois regimes in the region would be at risk.
The fear of action by the Egyptian population can also be seen in a separate statement from the Muslim Brotherhood issued last Wednesday. It
declares that the conditions which led to the revolt in Tunisia exist as well in many other countries in the region.
Social conditions for the broad mass of the population are even worse in Egypt than in Tunisia, as documented in statistics recently disclosed at
the national symposium of the Arab Labour Organisation (ALO). While in Tunisia 6.6 percent of the population lives on less than $2 a day, in Egypt the
figure is over 40 percent.
According to press reports, at least five people in Egypt have set themselves on fire in recent days in order to draw attention to their desperate
situation. In Tunisia, it was just such an incident that triggered the protests that forced the dictator Ben Ali to flee to Saudi Arabia.
Yes Egypt has had self-immolation protests. And they have media disinformation agents at work as well as can be seen in this article.
www.almasryalyoum.com...
- mike