copyright the Guardian, published in the Cambodia Daily, Oct. 30-31, 2010.
It is good news for vampires by bad news for gourmets. Garlic was last year's best-performing commodity in China, Morgan Stanley says, and its has continued to appreciate.
Until last spring, garlic cost as little as $0.06 a kilo, prompting many farmers to turn to other crops. But by April last year, demand was far outstripping supply and the price began to rocket. A bad harvest this year sent it up against and caused speculators to pile in; some reportedly made hundreds of thousands of dollars trading warehousefuls. This July, the price hit a high of $1.97 - where it remains.
For Chinese consumers, it is only the most painful example of rising food prices, in many cases caused by bad weather; September saw a year-on-year increase of around 8 percent.
Wu Fei, a 30-year-old accountant, said her family's food costs had almost doubled over the last two years, particularly because they love eating meat. "The price of ribs has never come down since it doubled a year ago. My favorite crispy dates were [$0.90] a pack, but now they are [$1.65] and the contents are smaller. The cooking oil we use was about [$9] a bottle; now it's [$15]," she said, adding: "The increases in prices are not matched by that of salaries in Beijing."
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