Exactly. I think people in the United States need to calm down. I don't mean to poo-poo the "global food crisis", there are people in the world who will not be able to eat because of it. However, this country will be largely unaffected by it. Global food crisis doesn't mean we'll soon be fighting in the supermarkets over the last box of poptarts (this isn't a hurricane afterall). It means the prices of food are high and that the second poorest people (and no-one in the US really fits in this category) can no longer buy food. These are the people who were working and feeding themselves at a poverty level, but now cannot afford to. The poorest people were already starving.

Since World War II, the biggest problem in the US has been and will remain not how to get enough food, but how to get rid of the huge amounts of food we produce. Some of it is sent overseas as food aid (about 50% of the world's food aid comes from the United States). Tons of the rest of it are converted into higher calorie more expensive food, principally dent corn into corn syrup. And more recently dent corn is being turned into ethanol to fuel cars.

Now, I will say the shelves at the commissary that are normally full of rice are currently mostly empty. Is this a threat to me? No, not in the slightest. One, the US is one of the largest rice producers in the world. If theres no rice on the shelves, its probably being sent overseas where people will starve with out it. The same is not true for Americans shopping at the commissary or any other grocery store for that matter. Two, I can turn around and see shelves fully stocked with cheap wheat and corn flour. OR I can walk down to produce and buy potatoes and turnips. If rice isn't available, I can make bread, grits, polenta, mashed potatoes and even my own pasta. When McDonalds and Burger King start shouting about the global food crisis, I'll start worrying. Until then, there are still plenty of staples for me to eat.