Hellenic Shipping News Worldwide
Global agri-food trade has more than doubled since 1995, amounting to $1.5 trillion in 2018, with emerging and developing countries’ exports on the rise and accounting for over one-third of the world’s total, according to a new report issued today by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).
The State of Agricultural Commodity Markets, 2020 (SOCO 2020) argues that global trade and well-functioning markets lie at the heart of the development process as they can spur inclusive economic growth and sustainable development, and strengthen resilience to shocks.
‘We need to rely on markets as an integral part of the global food system. This is all the more important in the face of major disruptions, whether they come from COVID-19, locust outbreaks or climate change,’ wrote FAO Director-General QU Dongyu in his introduction to the report.
The rise of global agri-food value chains
The report estimates that about one-third of global agricultural and food exports are traded within a global value chain and cross borders at least twice.