June 3, 2008 (LPAC)--The just-released LPAC Food Policy Memorandum documents that per capita world grain production has been dropping sharply since 1990. In that year, the world average was 372 kg per capita; by 2007, it had plunged over 15%, to 315 kg per capita.

To double food production, as the LPAC document demands, echoing Helga Zepp-LaRouche's call, it is necessary, among other measures, to capitalize and develop agriculture. In most of the world, there is a desperate shortage of tractors, fertilizer, irrigation, and other vital inputs required to make agriculture more productive. The following table, from FAO statistics, summarizes a few highlights for these poorest areas, as compared to the more acceptable levels prevalent in Europe, in 2002-03: