The pandemic created 62 new ‘food’ billionaires and the Ukraine war will make them richer

• The overall wealth of food corporations and billionaires in this business swelled by 45% in mere two years to a mammoth $382 billion.
• The biggest gainers of food price inflation is the privately owned Cargill family from the US - popularly known as ‘the richest people you have never heard of’.
• The fifth generation of Cargills and MacMillans added four more billionaires to the family which now has 12 billionaires.
• Oxfam’s research says that just 5.9% of the value of an average basket of groceries reaches small-scale farmers.

During the pandemic, people across the world were scrambling for food which became pricier. Needless to say, the pandemic made more food billionaires than any other, according to an Oxfam report.

Food and pharma are the best performing areas - but the rich in general did very well during the global pandemic. The pandemic created a billionaire every 30 hours while a million crashed into poverty every 33 hours since the pandemic.

The ‘richest people you have never heard of’ - has 12 billionaires in the family

The overall wealth of food corporations and billionaires swelled by 45% in mere two years to a mammoth $382 billion. This is a direct effect of rising food prices which went up by over 33% in 2021.

And, they could get richer as food prices would rise by another 23% in 2022 - supercharged by the Ukraine war.

Overall, the food industry created 62 new billionaires. The biggest gainer of the food price inflation is the privately owned Cargill Inc from the US - popularly known as ‘the richest people you have never heard of’.

The conglomerate in the business of grain storage, fertilizer and other agri businesses - has added four more billionaires to the family which now has 12 billionaires amongst the fifth generation of Cargills and MacMillans.

Last year, Cargill made its biggest profit in history – $5 billion - and is expected to beat its record again in 2022.

Wealth protected as dividends while small farmers made almost nothing

The Walton family of Walmart is now worth $238 billion — adding $8.8 billion since the pandemic started. They added $503,000 every hour, as per the report.

“Increasing profits and bumper dividend payments suggest that the family fortune is being protected. Oxfam’s research found that employees and workers in supply chains are those who suffer when corporations protect their profits, and that just 5.9% of the value of an average basket of groceries reaches small-scale farmers,” the report said.

At the same time, the food bills of people in low-income countries went up twice as much. In both rich and poor nations, people with low incomes spend most of their paycheck on food.

“Wages in many places are falling in real terms as they fail to keep pace with the cost of living. It has never been more expensive to be poor,” the report said.

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