By Tansa Musa
YAOUNDE (Reuters) - Two West African states took action on Friday to counter food price surges that have triggered protests in the region and caused what U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called a "global crisis".
Cameroon and Gabon were the latest countries in the world's poorest continent to introduce measures to offset soaring global prices for foodstuffs and fuel which aid experts say threaten to push 100 million people worldwide into hunger.
"This steeply rising price of food has developed into a real global crisis," U.N. Secretary-General Ban said in Vienna.
Concerns about food security increased this week as rice prices hit records in Asia and the United States warned that staples for the world's hungry were getting much more expensive.
Rice prices fell on Friday, but were still near record highs. Wheat and corn rose. The July rough rice contract on the Chicago Board of Trade slipped nearly 3 percent to $23.655 per hundredweight from a record $25.07 on Thursday.
Politically fragile West Africa is particularly exposed to price increases because the cost of food makes up such a large proportion of meagre household budgets and many countries rely heavily on imports -- especially of rice.
Anger over the cost of living helped trigger riots in Cameroon in late February in which dozens of people were killed. Protesters had also opposed a move by President Paul Biya to extend his 25-year rule.
Cameroon's Prime Minister Ephraim Inoni said a special fund was being set up to finance development of domestic farming and fisheries, and he called on his country's people to consume more locally-produced products instead of imports.
"The government will strive to turn the prevailing crisis into an opportunity to profoundly transform our agriculture, which should meet domestic demands and become a real exporter of foodstuffs," the prime minister said.
DUTIES SUSPENDED
In neighbouring Gabon, another oil producer, the government suspended for six months duties and taxes on imported food. It also imposed percentage limits on price margins charged by rice importers and reduced diesel rates by 37 percent for fishermen.
The economic measures taken by Gabon followed similar steps taken in recent weeks by Burkina Faso, Mali and Guinea.
Mauritania on Thursday announced the final part of a $160 million emergency programme to combat the rising prices, boost rice and cereal production and cut its dependency on exports.
Senegal and Liberia have also started schemes to revive their country's flagging farming sectors which have stagnated and declined during decades of neglect and underinvestment.
Price rises have been compounded because governments of several food-growing countries, worried about domestic shortages, have imposed export curbs, spooking markets at a time when world inventories are down sharply.
Ban said world leaders should discuss ways to improve food distribution systems and production.
"We must take immediate action in a concerted way," he said, adding that the crisis would be discussed at a meeting of U.N. agency heads, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund on April 28-29 in Berne, Switzerland.
Japan announced $100 million in emergency food aid on Friday, a day after the World Food Program said the cost of feeding the world's hungry had spiked nearly 40 percent amid spiralling food costs and oil prices.
In Haiti, the poorest country in the Americas, protests have brought down the government.
With the exception of Bangladesh, where some factory workers went on the rampage this month, Asian consumers have not taken to the streets to vent their frustration at the rising cost of food and fuel. But some people are still feeling the pinch.
"What can I do? Rice prices soar, we have to follow them," said Rudin, a 28-year-old shopper in Indonesia's capital, Jakarta.
