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High food prices spark protests

[Mauritania] WFP cereal bank, keeping villagers alive in southern and central Mauritania. [Date picture taken: 07/13/2006] Nicholas Reader/IRIN
WFP cereal bank in Kaedi, southern Mauritania
    DAKAR

    Several towns and cities in Mauritania have been hit by protests against rising food prices, according to news reports.

    On 12 November, in Zouérate in north central Mauritania the army was called in to disperse looters who vandalised and burned shops, according to the French news agency AFP. There has also been unrest in the towns Néma, Kiffa, Timbédra, Djiguenny, Kobeiny, Kankossa, Rosso and Ayoun, Radio France Internationale reported.

    According to the Mauritanian statistics agency, annual inflation has reached 28 percent on some locally-grown foodstuffs.

    But wheat products, a staple for animals and humans, have gone up more, due to international price increases.

    Mauritania grows just 30 percent of the food its three million people need and imported wheat prices have exploded by over 75 percent there this year, from US$200 for a ton to US$356, according to the food monitoring group FEWSNET.

    IRIN report on why prices are high in West Africa
    IRIN report on how traders accused of hoarding grain in Nigeria could affect the region

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    This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions

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