by price hikes following extreme climate events since 2022, a team of international scientists has found. The research released on Monday cites, among other examples, a 280 percent spike in global cocoa prices in April 2024, following a heatwave in Ghana and the Ivory Coast, and a 300 percent jump in lettuce prices in Australia after floods in 2022.

In the vast majority of cases, the increase in prices came soon after heatwaves, including a 70 percent increase in cabbage prices in South Korea in September 2024, a 48 percent increase in rice prices in Japan in September 2024, and an 81 percent increase in potato prices in India in early 2024. Other price increases were linked to drought, such as a 2023 drought in Brazil that preceded a 55 percent increase in global coffee prices the following year, and a 2022 drought in Ethiopia that came before overall food prices there increased by 40 percent in 2023.

The research, published by six European research organizations along with the European Central Bank, was released before the United Nations Food Systems Summit, which will be co-hosted by Ethiopia and Italy in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, from July 27 to July 29. “Until we get to net zero emissions extreme weather will only get worse, but it’s already damaging crops and pushing up the price of food all over the world,” the report’s lead author, Maximillian Kotz, from the Barcelona Supercomputing Center, said in a press release.

“People are noticing, with rising food prices number two on the list of climate impacts they see in their lives, second only to extreme heat itself,” Kotz added, noting that low-income families are often the most affected when “the price of food shoots up”.

The report comes as the cost of living, including food affordability, has been a key issue for many voters heading to elections around the world in recent years, including in Japan, where the price of rice was on many voters’ minds as they headed to the polls this weekend. Grocery prices were also key election issues in the United States and the United Kingdom in 2024 and in Argentina in 2023. (Al Jazeera/ Reuters)