Civil Penalties of Fraud Assessed by the United States Internal Revenue Service against corporations
Source:TracIRS

Those crying out for food prices to be fixed should be careful what they wish for. In many countries, dozens of corporations are under investigation for price fixing. In South Africa, the Competition Commission is going after milk producers. In Spain, the National Competition Commission has gone after retailers selling milk, eggs and bread. In the UK, the Office of Fair Trading has gone after major retailers like Tesco and Asda/Wal*Mart in a widespread investigation into price fixing in milk, food and toiletries.

The United States seems peculiarly immune to this kind of behaviour, though, and stands as a beacon for corporations in other parts of the world. The trend from 1999 to 2004 is that civil penalties both for fraud and negligence have halved. This could mean that companies are now twice as well behaved as they were under Clinton ... read more »

Raj's blog | 2 comments | email this page

Posted on 29 April, 2008 - 14:21

Great overview article at the BBC on the effects of rice price rises in Asia. Thanks dad!

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Posted on 29 April, 2008 - 19:10

Not for nothing is gender one of the most frequent tags here at Stuffed and Starved. The modern food system is tilted against women, in everything from land ownership to life expectancy because of poor diet to, now, access to the biofuels market. The road ahead is long. ... read more »

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Posted on 29 April, 2008 - 19:29

Two new books have been greedily devoured, constantly referred to, and highly regarded in my little world of late.

One is Mark Bittman's How To Cook Everything Vegetarian.

The other is A Short History of the American Stomach.

... read more »

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Posted on 30 April, 2008 - 02:20