Working Paper 97 - Soaring Food Prices and Africa's Vulnerability and Responses: An Update

Food prices rose rapidly in 2007 and in early2008, but started falling during the second halfof 2008. Despite this fall, many African countriesare yet to recover from the severe economicand social strain caused by the suddenescalation of prices. This situation, however,has triggered renewed attention that couldboost agriculture and help it acquire its rightfulplace on Africa’s development agenda. Indeed,numerous opportunities to exploit Africa’s unusedproduction potential exist, but this requiresappropriate policy responses, accompanied byadequate investments to enhance Africa’s agriculturalrevitalization.This paper seeks to review current food priceson the continent and present a country levelvulnerability analysis that formed the basis forthe Bank’s operational and policy response tofood price increases.