An average Indian eats a small fraction of the meat eaten by a person from other continents, especially the Americas. And factory farming is marginal . An Indian eats cereals such as rice, wheat, barley or coarse grains eg. millets and meat once or twice a week..Look for obesity in any country!

acharya, Bangalore, India

I sympathise Dave Larkman, but don't come here - it's £5 ($10) a gallon - almost all tax.
A decent Social Security system, free education, free medical treatment, was always going to be expensive - but affordable. Unfortunately, it's acted as a magnet for every free-loader on the Planet.

Ken Leyland, Liverpool, U.K.

Perhaps its time to restrict food sales to that wonderful cartel called OPEC.
Give them a tast e of their own medicine.
It costs the Saudis 3 dollars a barrel to lift their oil.
Yet all they grow is a lot of inedible sand.
Raising food /commodity prices would get petrodollars back

wilfred knight, orange county, usa

Electricity suppliers are putting up their prices by another 25%, they obviously feel that prices are going to remain high, I mean, they obviously aren't going to be profiteering, are they?

David Leslie, Perth, Scotland

The more I read, the more I am convinced that the oil industry is just a big con. I welcome a high oil price, it will release funds for the engineers and chemists of the world to go and find alternatives and take power away from the big oil companies, who have had it too good for too long.

LJS, EDINBURGH, Scotland

I know the price of oil has peaked because last week I convinced myself that the price can only continue to rise-a sure sign its time to get out.

Dave Larkman , White Salmon , USA

China and India are eating less rice but more meat, much more. Hence the rise in grain prices which isn't going to go away soon. Given your record on getting pretty much everything wrong, and today's Bank of England report saying everything's rosy, then I'm pretty sure we're all doomed!

Polly Parish, tenby, wales

Credit bubble, Oil bubble, Chinese equities bubble, Agriculture bubble, property bubble.... The low interest rates have made every man and his dog a fund manager and they are all chasing the same investment as the greater fool theory runs wild!

Kv, London,

Whatever the hope in this article of better days to come, there is still the real problem of using food crops to make vehicle fuel which is foolish and unnecessary. All biodiesel should be made from waste and no other source should be permitted. Tehcnology exists and should be exploited.

johnwg, London, UK

The main problem with alternative energy or alternative fuels, is the installing the infrastructure to collect the energy, or dispense the fuel.

When was the last time you drove past a hydrogen fuel station here let alone in China or India?

This will not change before 2050, let alone 2020.

Calvin, London,

Sir, the recent comment about oil prices is true, the USA and a number of countries are sitting on large amounts of oil be it conventional or unconventional (tar sands) and OPEC will soon drop prices when the west and Asia start too look at these sources more and more, oil and gas will run the world for the next 100 years and we will have a number of these economical cycles.

bill foy, Liverpool, England

"zero pollution compressed air car"? That is not true at all, It requires electricity to compress the air before it gets to the car. Electricity that is currently generated from burning fossil fuels. Recharging a battery uses less electricity, so electric cars are the future not air cars.

GM, Brisbane,

Oil mania and oil dominance are both going to end soon, because of the birth of the zero pollution compressed air car. It doesn't use any of their products. By 2020, the majority of cars in America and Europe could be CAC's. Goodbye evil, old, oil world we used to know.

victor compton, Cherbourg, France

You can pump more oil, and mine more gold, but can you stop humans continually making another one and a half million mouths to feed every week?

DAVID VINTER, Louth , Lincs., UK.

"The Chinese and Indians are not eating any more rice today than they were three months ago." Incorrect. The populations of these two countries are increasing by a combined 26 million people per year. So today they have 8.5 million more mouths to feed than 3 months ago.

Ted, London, UK

Mr. Kaletsky could do a better analysis by calling things by their REAL names, e.g. "speculative market" should be called GREED-DRIVEN market. As long as greed is permitted to play its present all-important role we will always see these wild market swings and the poor will always be the victim.

Hans de Koning, Leiderdorp, Netherlands

Apparently the banks have been speculating big time on oil. Expect to see some more massive losses reported by these most inept organisations. Unfortunately their stupidity and greed affect us all, no matter what we do. I think the time has come for regulators to ringfence UK retail banking.

Jonathan Spencer, London, UK

So on the back of the BoE (Brown/Darling) asking the lenders to commit financial suicide for queen and country and catch 'the falling knife' all we have to worry about now is raising prices. I don't think so Anatole Kaletsky, but nice try on the morning of local elections. Much pain to come.

D Case, Newquay,

It is with typical New Labour arrogance that they preach the higher morale ground trying to encourage 'environment friendly' policies while at the same time reaping the rewards through a higher & higher tax grab they then squander our money through ill thought policies.
Darren Coll, Dundee

Mr Darren Coll, Dundee,

So the speculation on oil and food is comming to an end (as it did on stocks and housing) the question is where will it go next. the speculation requires these peaks and troughs to be profitable, but having hit housing and now food and fuel what will be next ?

ben, folkestone, uk

Surely if Governments are concerned about the price of oil all they need to do (which I admit may be easier said than done) is convince OPEC to announce a huge increase in production. That should signal a downward spiral in prices and put an end to the speculators who have driven the price up.

peter fieldman, paris, france

'...appear in the nick of time [...], just like the US cavalry riding to the rescue in a classic cowboy film.'

If you are not already aware of it, have a listen to Gil Scott-Heron's 'B Movies'. Superb commentary that was versed in the time of Ronald 'The Ray-Gun'.

Alistair Kipling, Birmingham,

This may not be the turning point for oil, where supply turns down past its peak. However, that point must come eventually, as it takes millenia for oil to for and only decades to burn it up. What oil and food have in common is that a small proportional deficit between demand and supply is painful

John, Edinburgh, Scotland

The idea that there is plenty of oil is based on unaudited government claims in places like Saudi, where reserves are said to be exactly the same as they were although billions of barrels have been used.
For a realistic view based on field by field analysis, see here:
http://www.energybulletin.net/1

David Martin, Bristol,

Technical analysis like astrology is a very useful technique for remaining calm when your unsure what is happening or why. Seeing the Elliot wave your worry concerning the unknowns in the future are reduced - its a pure gamble should your wave function hit the price of things to come however!

kevin, Lincoln, UK