“No Turning Point Yet” – Soaring Food Inflation To Continue Into 2022: Commodity Expert

Soaring food inflation has still more room to run and will continue well into 2022, according to Judy Ganes, the president of J. Ganes Consulting.

Ganes was interviewed on Bloomberg Television Friday and said rising food prices should continue into the middle of next year.

“We're not seeing a turning point just yet, we'll probably see it, my guess is the middle of next year. There's a point where high prices are the best cure for high prices, there's a point where its going to have to resolve itself,” she said.

She pointed out rising prices were due to a combination of factors, such as caps on migration, red hot labor market, labor shortages, adverse weather conditions, snarled supply, higher fertilizer prices, and soaring transportation costs.

Ganes said the end to several major droughts and increased rainfall in major producing areas means global food production in 2023-24 will be “much improved.”

For instance, she pointed out that farmers worldwide are experiencing higher costs due to labor shortages and expensive fertilizer. “In Brazil, labor rates have to match what the inflation rate is, and if inflation is at 10%, then wages go up 10%, and that hits straight through the supply chain,” she said.

Brazil is a top ag country, producing everything from citrus to coffee to beef. Much of the ag goods are transported around the world, especially to the US.

Ganes' view that food inflation is persistent comes one day after Cargill CEO David MacLennan told Bloomberg he changed his mind about “transitory” inflation and now believes it will be more persistent with higher food prices in 2022.

“I thought inflation in ags and food was transitory. I feel less so now because of continued shortages in labor markets,” MacLennan said during an interview at the Bloomberg New Economy Forum in Singapore. “That's one of the inputs to the supply chain that we're watching most carefully.”

The latest data from the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization's food price index shows that October prices climbed to a new decade high, mainly due to soaring vegetable oils and cereals.

Compound rising food prices with higher energy, shelter, and vehicle cost, working poor Americans have seen their real wages turn negative this year. Core CPI in October spiked to its highest since August 1991…

John Maynard Keynes once said: “When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do?” And as the facts prove today, inflation is not as “transitory” as the Biden administration and the Federal Reserve want everyone to believe. They've doubled down on the narrative that will likely prove to become a dangerous bet ahead of the 2022 midterms, where people might vote with their depleted wallets.