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Last update - 23:36 27/04/2008 Agriculture Minister: No food shortage expected in Israel By Ofri Ilani, Rina Rosengerg, and Bar Hayoun Tags: world food crisis  Agriculture Minister Shalom Simhon on Sunday said that Israel could potentially grow itself the grains that it currently imports, but it chooses not to because the high cost of water makes the venture unprofitable. "We can grow more grains, if we decide that it is necessary. But it is not productive, because we don't have the water for it. We are facing a serious water crisis, and that is our main problem right now, more than the food crisis. In Israel, the water is a bigger problem than the cost of food," Simhon told Haaretz. The minister made these remarks after a senior business official recently stated that rice prices in Israel will rise by 70 percent, along with price hikes for other staple goods like tuna, flour, coffee, cooking oil, and sugar. Advertisement Simhon said that due to the global food crisis, the government would postpone carrying out a prior decision to lift the governmental supervision on milk prices. "We understand that this is not the time to lift the supervision, though the decision has already been made," Simhon said, and added that "we have a problem in that we feed our animals imported seeds, and when the prices of seeds go up, the prices of mild and chicken goes up accordingly." However, the minister stressed that "right now there is no shortage of any food products in Israel, and no shortage is expected." On the other hand, the Israeli consumer is currently paying more as a result of the global food crisis. Rice prices at the Supersol supermarket chain went up between 33 and 65 percent on Sunday, in accordance with the price hike announced by "Sugat", which controls 70 percent of the rice sold in Israel. Sugat said that last weekend, the demand for rice rose by several hundred percent. They maintained that the public, fearful of the global food crisis and rising rice prices, began hoarding rice. A source in the retail market confirmed that rice sales ahead of Passover this year were three times higher than the record. Sources in the food industry say that oil and coffee products will rise by 5 to 10 percent, and the price of candy and price-controlled bread will also rise. These hikes accumulate atop the 13 percent average price hike for hundreds of products over the last year. Restaurants also announced a hike in the prices of dishes in the near future due to the rising global food costs. However, not everyone intends to raise prices ? food giants Osem and Tnuva say they don't expect to raise prices in the near future. Despite the obvious trend, the fear of a rice shortage in Israel has dissipated. Supersol, who rationed rice sales over the last two days, lifted the 2-bag per customer restriction. According to sources in the supermarket chain, the restriction was imposed in order to prevent people from hoarding products and selling them during crisis for an enormous profit. According to economy experts, there is no rice shortage in the world, nor is there a shortage of any kind of food, only panic that fuels itself. Bookmark to del.icio.us   Survivors and pioneers Yad Vashem exhibit shows how Holocaust survivors helped shape Israel's identity Researching bacon Lahav's pig breeding gained widespread notoriety because of its legal loophole.

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