And while the debate roars on whether recent rises in inflation are one-offs or a sign of changing times, food prices soar some more.

Down under there’s a shortage of rain; in Argentina it was too cold for farmers’ liking. In Germany it was chucking it down with rain throughout the July harvest, we could go on. It appears that in 2007, the world had the wrong type of weather.

At the same time, the increasing use of bio-fuels, in which crops that could otherwise have been used for food are being used as an alternative to oil, has helped push up demand.

It all proved too much, and this week the price of wheat on the futures market has soared – hitting $10 a bushel – that’s the highest level ever.

It won’t mean that the food we eat will immediately soar, the big food suppliers, people like Kelloggs, for example, agree long-supply contracts, fixing prices for a while. But these contracts will end. So you see, it’s a little like fixed rate mortgages.

So, it really seems to hinge on whether food prices stay up – if they do, then the prices we pay will rise too.

The UN is worried about it. Its Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) says, “Currently 37 countries worldwide are facing food crises due to conflict and disasters. In addition, food security is being adversely affected by unprecedented price hikes for basic food, driven by historically low food stocks, droughts and floods linked to climate change, high oil prices and growing demand for bio-fuels. High international cereal prices have already sparked food riots in several countries.”

FAO said, “Some countries like Malawi have proven that it is possible to boost local food production through the provision of vouchers for farm inputs”.

“The Malawi programme, helped by good rains, has over the last two years produced spectacular results whereby maize production in 2006/07 was one million metric tonnes higher than national maize requirements. The value of the extra production was double that of the investment provided. Many small-scale farmers have benefited and have increased production for their own consumption. The Malawi success could be replicated by other countries facing a very difficult food production environment.”

And it called for action to help other poor counties saying, “Urgent and new steps are needed to prevent the negative impacts of rising food prices from further escalating, and to quickly boost crop production in the most affected countries.”

But returning to the west, does this mean inflation will set in?

Remember, inflation is a sustained rise in prices. So food will need to keep going up, before it be classified as inflationary. Capital Economics also says that “the drivers of the recent surge in food prices have been temporary rather than permanent, including poor harvests and an upsurge in animal diseases. Speculative pressures have also helped to inflate agricultural commodity prices: the recent falls in copper prices show how quickly these pressures can unwind.”

But we will leave you with one worry. If the succession of bad harvests is just bad luck, then that’s good, because luck will change. But if it’s down to climate change, then that is altogether much more serious.