Food Prices

The increased use of ethanol could cost the government up to $900 million for food stamps and child nutrition programs, a congressional report says. Higher use of the corn-based fuel additive accounted for about 10% to 15% of the rise in food prices from April 2007 to April 2008, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.

Although prices may still seem painfully high in the supermarket aisles, long-suffering consumers are beginning to see a break in their grocery bills -- a bit of good news amid economic gloom.

The economic crisis has now spread from Wall Street to Main Street to the places where there are no streets. In slums and shacks around the world, hunger is gnawing again as job opportunities shrink but food prices do not.

There's a tug-of-war underway over food prices between the nation's supermarkets and giant food manufacturers including Nestle, Unilever and Kellogg.

McDonald's Corp. said Tuesday that it would increase the price of its $1 double cheeseburger to $1.19 in December to cover rising costs, ending the sandwich's run as the top-selling item on the 6-year-old dollar menu.

It is hard to spot what happened this year in the peanut butter aisles of local supermarkets. But a careful look at the jars of Skippy on the shelves may reveal a surprise.

Californians voted resoundingly to free about 20 million egg-laying hens of tiny cages. But in passing Proposition 2, the farm animal welfare measure, did the state's consumers yoke themselves to higher egg prices? For months farmers had contended that the measure would drive up egg prices or even put them out of business because of the high cost of retrofitting their farms with cage-free facilities.

Ken Locke of Moscow, Idaho, usually eats at home. "I have ramen multiple times each week," he says. "Of course, I add stuff to it -- carrots, green onion, spinach, egg -- but the ramen is the foundation.