According to the World Bank’s most recent Commodity Market Report, the declining value of the Nigerian naira and the currencies of other emerging economies is raising the cost of food and gasoline in ways that could exacerbate the food and energy crises that many of them already face.
According to the research, prices for the majority of commodities have dropped from their recent peaks in US dollars amid worries about a coming global recession.
The price of Brent crude oil in US dollars declined by almost 6% between the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 and the end of last month, it was also stated
Yet, because of currency depreciations, almost 60 percent of oil-importing emerging markets and developing economies saw an increase in domestic-currency oil prices during this period.
According to the Washington-based bank, nearly 90 percent of these economies also saw a larger increase in wheat prices in local-currency terms compared to the rise in U.S. dollars.
It said elevated prices of energy commodities that served as inputs to agricultural production have been driving up food prices.
During the first three quarters of 2022, studies by the World Bank Group showed that food-price inflation in South Asia averaged more than 20 percent.
Food price inflation in other regions, including Latin America and the Caribbean, the Middle East and North Africa, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Eastern Europe and Central Asia, averaged between 12 and 15 percent.
Author
