The financial panic and economic slowdown have put at least a temporary end to the commodity bull market of the last seven years.

The financial panic and economic slowdown have put at least a temporary end to the commodity bull market of the last seven years.

As food prices soar, the improbable business of buying and reforming collective farms has attracted financiers.

A surge in U.S. commodity exports is a relief in an otherwise bleak economy, but it is an unreliable prop for an industrial power.

Commodity exports are surging. That’s a welcome relief, but it won’t help reverse the loss of manufacturing jobs, and it’s an unreliable prop for an industrial power.

Sudan is capitalizing on high global food prices at a time when millions there barely have enough to eat.

Sudan is capitalizing on high global food prices at a time when millions of people in its Darfur region barely have enough to eat.

Recent floods were likely to have damaged the corn and soybean harvest less than feared and farmers have planted more corn than previously expected, the government said.

Farmers will harvest nearly 9 percent fewer acres of corn this year than last year, in part because of Midwest flooding, the government reported Monday.

India’s supply of arable land is second only to that of the U.S., but it must buy some foods on international markets, exacerbating a global food crisis.