This morning before my daily tea, and bowl of cereal I saw this article, which discusses the rise of prices worldwide. Most interesting to me was the doubling or tippling of prices of some soft commodities in Egypt. Egypt is a country where I have personally spent some time both for leisure and for schooling, which makes images such as the one below even more vivid and real.

Egypt is the most densely populated Arab state. It is also the second largest recipient of U.S. foreign aid, a lot of which it uses to purchase American wheat. Increase in commodity prices, oil prices (which has decreased the buying power of some of the oil producing countries), and driven by a boom in consumption in China and India are causing serious pain in many regions of the Arab world. Saudi Arabia, a state which in recent history has had near zero inflation has now hit 7 percent inflation. There have been riots against the increase in prices on soft commodities such as butter, milk, wheat and sugar in Jordan, Morocco and Egypt (claiming 7 lives).

Walking the streets of Egypt it is easy to see the poverty (20% of Egyptian population lives under the poverty line), beggars are in every street corner, individuals plagued with polio, and high illiteracy. In tough times every one feels the pain, especially the poor, and Egypt is an example of that.