Summary of newsmakers of the previous day – 24.4.2008

Interest in agricultural land grows fast in EU; prices are record

An interest in agricultural land grows fast in the European Union. Prices of fields are pulled up above all by growing prices of commodities which also consumers experienced in shops. This trend is supported by some real estate funds which instead of purchase start to invest in agricultural land. Today's issue of the daily Financial Times writes it. Only in Great Britain price for an acre of land (0,405 hectare) has recently increased by roughly 40 percents; at the same time it stayed the same in last 20 years. “It is not only land in Britain whose value grows intensely.

German farmers protests against price of milk

Behaviour of business chains reminds a declaration of war! A chairman of an agricultural union of Baden-Württemberg said during today's demonstration of milk producers in Stuttgart: “What does Aldi and other chains in Germany with price of milk and milk products equals to declaration of state of war. In the presence of more than 1500 protesting breeders he proclaimed: ”We are ready to fight”. The Bund Deutscher Milchviehhalter (BDM) (German Milk-Producers Union) repeatedly called upon breeders to declare “milk strike”. According to a spokesman of BDM it is possible that consumers will stand in front of empty shelves of business chains.

Prices of rice in Asia reached new records; concern for supply spreads

A price of rice in Thailand, the biggest world exporter of this commodity, increased to record 1000 dollars per ton today and from beginning of the year it has grown to triple. A spurt growth of prices of this basic food of the most of developing world invokes a concern for food safety already not only in Asia and Africa but also in the United States. An intense growth of prices of basic foods is according to representatives of international humanitarian organizations and development agencies a disaster for tens of millions of the poor who spend most of their incomes for foods.

Fight against BSE is successful

The European Commission approved a new legal enactment concerning a shift of age limit valid for a duty to remove a spine in slaughter of cattle from 24 to 30 months. Brussels/Berlin - The situation in a fight against BSE, according to estimation of the European Commission, further improves. On base of the achieved progress the EC passed a legal enactment which adjusts a shift of the bottom limit of age of cattle in which a spine has to be removed in slaughter from 24 to 30 months. On the expiry of a control term in length of three month from the side of European Parliament the legal enactment has been now passed by the EC.